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The article offers a clear and succinct account of the Amazon approach to Agile management (though it doesn’t call it that, and offers best practices to enable others to learn how to think–and act–like Amazon.

The article draws on the insights and experiences of John Rossman an Amazon senior manager who was an effective innovator for the company.

Amazon has a distinctive approach to implementing the three principles of Agile: 10;∙9; Customer-obsessed. 10;∙9; Small is beautiful. 10;∙9; Networks.

Customer obsession at Amazon is enabled and driven by customer-driven metrics.

Drawing on his experience innovating for the company, John Rossman describes in detail how Amazon created an environment with very different values and behaviors, an approach that employs the principles of Agile management.

Large digital platforms face intense scrutiny over self-preferencing, which involves a platform provider favoring its own offers over those of competitors. In online marketplaces, also called retail or e-commerce platforms, much of the academic and regulatory debate focuses on determining whether the marketplace provider gives preference to its own private labels, such as “Amazon Basics” or Walmart’s “Great Value” products. However, we outline, both conceptually and empirically, that self-preferencing can also occur through other dimensions of vertical integration – namely, retailing and fulfillment.

This article contributes by conceptualizing three dimensions of vertical integration in online marketplaces – private labels, retailing and fulfillment. Then, two studies empirically assess (1) which of the 20 most-visited global online marketplaces vertically integrates which dimension and (2) which share of 600 m available offers is vertically integrated to which degree in eleven international Amazon marketplaces.

The majority of the leading marketplaces vertically integrate all three dimensions, implying ample opportunities for self-preferencing. Across international Amazon marketplaces, only 0.02% of available offers consist of an Amazon private-label product. However, Amazon is a retailer for around 31% and fulfills around 38% of all available offers in its marketplaces. Hence, self-preferencing on Amazon can occur most frequently through retailing and fulfillment but comparatively infrequently through private-label offers. Still, these shares differ substantially by country – every second offer is vertically integrated in the USA, but only one in ten in India.

Most of the self-preferencing debate often focuses on private-label products. Instead, we present large-scale empirical results showing that self-preferencing on Amazon could occur most often through retailing and fulfillment because these channels affect much larger shares of offers. We also measure the variation of these shares across countries and relate them to regulatory environments.

This research delves into a comprehensive examination of Amazon’s Vendor Flex (VF) model, seeking to illuminate the intricacies of supply chain innovation through alliances between Amazon and its suppliers. Employing a multiple case study methodology, the study investigates the reduction of transaction costs, the establishment of strategic alliances for supply chain innovation and governance issues within these alliances.

A multiple case study methodology, incorporating personal interviews and triangulation with primary sources, was employed to unravel the dynamics of the VF model.

Results indicate that the VF model aligns with the reduction of transaction costs by leveraging Amazon’s specialized knowledge, although not necessarily through direct knowledge sharing. Amazon suppliers highlight competitive advantages gained through VF, showcasing efficient navigation of peak seasons and a focus on core activities with online retailing integration. The VF alliance represents a collaborative model where Amazon’s technological prowess enables a streamlined and innovative supply chain for online retailing, which resembles a vertical integration process.

This research underscores the potential of strategic alliances to drive innovation by incorporating industry-leading practices. The governance issues within the VF alliance reveal power imbalances, emphasizing the need for managers to govern dynamics, disclose information and build trust in large-scale alliances.

Toxic leadership is often studied from a leader-centric perspective, which focuses on the detrimental outcomes of leaders with destructive ideas and practices. In this chapter, we provide a global value chain (GVC) perspective, which accounts for effects of corporate leadership from inception of a product or service idea to its consumption across the value chain. In particular, we demonstrate how toxic leadership is sustained through an illusio, i.e., the allure of the often-charismatic leadership discourse, which is rendered unaccountable due to lack of global regulation of GVCs. This allows for global organizations and toxic leaders to exploit weaknesses in national-level regulation. Drawing on a netnographic study of toxic leadership in Amazon, we demonstrate how toxic leadership created the illusion of success while perpetuating toxicity and exploitation across their complex value chains internationally.

Many Internet retailers must raise margins in the future if they are to survive. This raises the important issues of whether they will be able to raise margins as well as how valuation estimates made today should evaluate projected changes to margins in the future. In this paper, we describe retail strategies of pricing for market share in growing markets and show how measures of the price elasticity of demand facing retailers in the current year can be combined with standard accounting variables to inform calculations about future margins. Our analysis suggests that the capital market projects greater future margin improvements for Amazon.com than for BN.com and that this may be due to Amazon benefiting from network effects.

The purpose of this chapter is to analyse the possible causes of the Peruvian Amazon Company’s death.

This study uses secondary sources to document the trajectory of the Peruvian Amazon Company, the rubber export boom, and the different market forces affecting the wild rubber industry. By examining different sources that document the case of the Peruvian Amazon Company and the wild rubber extraction in the Amazon, this text aims to analyse the possible causes of the Peruvian Amazon Company extinction.

After analysing the existing literature on the Peruvian Amazon Company and the wild rubber industry, it was possible to find evidence about the problems related with land ownership, labour and international prices, along with the internationally known scandals, as the principal causes of the company’s death.

The case of the Peruvian Amazon Company, explores how an unsustainable business model could eventually lead a once successful company to its death. The contribution of the following chapter is based on the description of the causes of the Peruvian Amazon Company’s death. Previous studies had analysed the internationalization strategies implemented by the company. Although, an evaluation of causes of the company’s real extinction had not been presented.

Women’s indigenous organizations have existed for years in the Colombian Amazon. Yet, information about their members’ motivations and the opportunities and barriers those organizations face is missing in the literature on the indigenous movement, ecofeminist struggles, and efforts for a good life in Colombia. This chapter analyzes the connection between women’s indigenous organizations and the territory’s efforts to contain climate change. Two sources inform our understanding of the relationship: the systematization of the main program in Colombian institutional history supporting indigenous women’s led associations linked to conservation efforts, “Women Caregivers of the Amazon” and the mapping of indigenous women’s organizations in the region. This chapter offers a critical impact evaluation of the program “Women Caregivers of the Amazon,” analyzing the way in which the ecological native discourse, particularly on environmental practices of indigenous women, has permeated conservation initiatives in the Colombian Amazon. The impact this has had on women’s participation in self-governance and environmental governance remains to be analyzed. However, mapping indigenous women’s organizations in 2021 offered relevant information on those organizations and their care and conservation practices in the Amazon Forest. In turn, the systematization of “Caregivers of the Amazon” results offers an updated analysis of the scope, limitations, best practices, and lessons learned in developing the projects. A longitudinal and comparative analysis of these two sources of information will lead to an understanding of the incidence of intergovernmental and civil society actions for mitigation and adaptation to climate change carried out by indigenous women’s organizations.

Industry platforms can alter relations among exchange partners in such a way that the industry structure is changed. The focus of much industry platform research has been on how platform creation and leadership offers advantages to the most central firms, but platforms can also be advantageous for small specialist firms that compete with the most central firms. We examine book publishing as an example of an industry in which the central players – large publishing firms – are losing power to self-publishing authors because the distributor Amazon has a powerful platform for customers to communicate independently, and the non-publishing platform Twitter also serves as a medium for readers to discuss and review books. Our empirical analysis is based on downloaded sales statistics for Amazon Ebooks, matched with Amazon reviews of the same books and tweets that refer to the book or the author. We analyze how Ebook sales are a function of publisher, Amazon reviews, and tweets, and we are able to assess the importance of each factor in the sale of book titles. The main finding is that Amazon reviews are powerful drivers of book sales, and have greater effect on the sales of books that are not backed by publishers. Twitter also affects book sales, but less strongly than Amazon reviews.

In the digital economy, what are the strategies of multinationals from developed countries and emerging markets? How do regulations in the home country affect their growth? Recent digital multinationals in diverse national and institutional contexts raise questions that require new approaches in international business (IB) studies. This chapter examines two leading firms in the global e-commerce industry: Amazon and Alibaba. We compare their digital capabilities and physical asset-building strategies over the past two decades and we connect the Internet governance environment in the United States and China with their business models and internationalization patterns. We argue that despite the platform and global nature of Amazon’s and Alibaba’s activities, the recent moves of governments across the world to regulate Internet governance poses an important challenge for digital multinationals. This research features a comparative analysis of two prominent digital multinationals and identifies a promising area for future IB strategy studies.