Re:Amazon to Acquire Whole Foods for $13.7B
by mindcrime on Friday June 16, 2017 @04:56PM
(#14572578)
Amazon is simply too much - time for the monopoly-busters to break them apart.
What exactly does Amazon have a monopoly on?
Selling books? Nope, Barnes & Noble and Walmart and others compete there.
Cloud computing? Nope, check Google, Microsoft, IBM, Racksapce, Linode, etc.
Selling other random stuff on the net? No, Target, Walmart and a bazillion specialty sites also do that.
Groceries? Obviously not.
The idea behind anti-trust / monopoly law is generally to prevent a company from leveraging a monopoly in one area to gain excessive control in another area. I don't see how anyone can argue that Amazon are doing anything like that.
Being big and successful is not, in and of itself, wrong.
https://www.google.com/search?q=whole+foods+stock&oq=whole+f...
http://www.chron.com/business/article/Kroger-s-darkening-out...
Amazon buying WF will likely have two results:
1) As long as Mackey can run the company WF employees will stay. Once he leaves (likely soon), they will leave. This is an opportunity for some other investor with Mackey's same principles to buy up WF's human capital. For example, Starbucks will benefit b/c former WF employees make good baristas.
2) Amazon will be left with the infrastructure of WF, primarily the real estate, warehouses, storefronts and whatever slice of humanity Amazon hires to replace former WF employees. So maybe Amazon wants WF primarily for the locations, the real estate and the warehousing capacity. They're getting a good price by buying while WF is at a low.
Amazon is simply too much - time for the monopoly-busters to break them apart.