Reuters: Amazon Wireless?

June 2, 2023

Amazon’s opportunity to offer mobile service to Prime subscribers

Running Point and its chief investment officer, Michael Ashley Schulman, CFA, were quoted by Reuters in an article—by Yuvraj Malik, Aditya Soni, Tanya Jain, Akash Sriram, David Shepardson, and Sheila Dang, “US telecom companies say not in talks with Amazon for wireless services”—regarding Amazon’s rumored negotiations with U.S. telecom firms to offer low-cost wireless services to its Amazon Prime members.

The article was picked up by Yahoo Finance, U.S. News & World Report, New York Post, Investing.com, Kreuznacher Rundschau (Germany), Al Jazeera, Channel News Asia, India Times, The Star (Malaysia), and others.

Prime dialing for members

A technology and consumer giant like Amazon creates huge ripples when it enters or reinvents a market. Will telecom be next? Amazon, T-Mobile, and Verizon all deny the claim, nonetheless, it is intersting to ponder. With its bulk buying power, Amazon can undercut regular consumer subscription pricing and potentially draw millions or tens of millions of peopleaway from their current mobile plans and deliver customers at scale to a single carrier. In the capital intensive world of 5G mobile telecom, were service is increasingly a utility with heavy fixed costs, such a transference of demand could make or break a carrier.

Several possible benefits may accrue to Amazon from offering wireless service as a Prime membership benefit. Such a move could improve Prime member retention rates, allow Amazon to slightly increase annual subscription costs because of the uplift in perceived benefits, attract new customers to Amazon Prime, and provide Amazon a direct channel to the lucrative multi-billion dollar market of selling and financing mobile phones and possibly tracking some mobile phone data.

Quoted article excerpt is below:

“Several possible benefits may accrue from such a move including improving Prime member retention rates, allowing it to slightly increase annual subscription costs and providing Amazon a direct channel to the lucrative multi-billion dollar market of selling and financing mobile phones,” said Michael Ashley Schulman, chief investment officer at Running Point Capital Advisors.

In German: „Aus einem solchen Schritt würden sich mehrere potenzielle Vorteile ergeben, darunter verbesserte Bindungsraten für Kernmitglieder, die es ermöglichen würden, die jährlichen Abonnementkosten leicht zu erhöhen und Amazon einen direkten Kanal zum lukrativen Multimilliarden-Dollar-Markt für den Verkauf und die Finanzierung von Mobiltelefonen zu bieten“, sagte er Michael Ashley. Schulman, Chief Investment Officer bei Running Point Capital Advisors.

Amazon Mobile
Amazon Mobile — Graphic design by Yrtist.com

Mobile is becoming not only the new digital hub but also the bridge to the physical world. That’s why mobile will affect more than just your digital operations; it will transform your entire business.

Thomas Husson, Vice President at Forrester Research

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