WhenAmazon bought the robotics company, Kiva was supplying technology to a large number of retailers,including Gap, Staples, and Walgreens.1636 Many of these customers had invested a sunk cost of $4million to $6 million per warehouse in order to make use of Kiva’s technologies.1637 Kiva hadpromised to keep shipping its technology to non-Amazon customers—regardless of whether theycompeted with Amazon—but in 2015, Amazon rebranded the company as Amazon Robotics andannounced it would stop servicing other firms.1638 Amazon stated that retailers seeking to use Kiva’srobots would need to use Amazon Services to fulfill orders with Amazon’s technology in Amazon’swarehouses

Amazon’s documents show that the firm entered into an aggressive price war, inwhich Amazon was willing to bleed over $200 million in losses on diapers in one month.

Amazon’s internal documents said that Diapers.com “keep[s] the pressure on pricingon us” and provided extremely high customer service levels, which—prior to the merger—had forcedAmazon to up its game

In 2017, the company made its largest acquisition to date bypurchasing Whole Foods for $13.7 billion.1601 Amazon’s other large purchases include Ring, which itbought for $1.2 billion in 2018; PillPack, which it bought for $1 billion in 2018; and Zappos, which itbought for $1.2 billion in 2009.1602 Over the years, Amazon has acquired an assortment of highlyrecognizable companies, including IMDB.com, which it bought in 1998; Audible, which it bought in2008; Goodreads, which it bought in 2013; and Twitch, which it bought in 2014.

Amazon’sinternal documents recognize that entry into online commerce “require[s] significant incrementalinvestments in brand development, inventory, and marketing/customer acquisition.”

As Lentz says, the platforms focus on routine and repetitive work and can prevent “lawyers getting blamed for being the bottleneck in the process.”

It also won’t save clients any money in the near future, though the firm says cost savings could come as the technology gets more advanced.

Knowledge Bases and Knowledge Acquisition