Amazon

Logistics Management Group News Editor Jeff Berman recently caught up with Tom Racciatti, a director in West Monroe’s Operations Excellence practice, to get some fresh perspective on Amazon’s supply chain.

During the shipping company's earnings call last week, FedEx CEO Mike Glenn brought up the Amazon rumors, calling them headline-grabbing but not realistic.

The maturation of multi-channel distribution has put added pressure on all major modes of freight transportation, with “Just-in-time” and “just-in-case” strategies now having to meet the “just do it” demands created by today’s highly impatient consumer.

In a deal with potentially wide-ranging implications, Amazon fulfillment services, a subsidiary or e-commerce behemoth Amazon, has inked a deal with Air Transport Services Group (ATSG) in which ATSG will operate an air cargo network to serve United States-based customers.

The discount retailer has poached Arthur Valdez, a 16-year veteran of Amazon.com, to head its supply chain and logistics operations as it looks to better integrate its stores with its fast-growing online digital e-commerce initiatives.

Amazon.com Inc is quietly inviting drivers for its new "on-demand" delivery service to handle its standard packages, as the online retailer known for low prices and razor-thin profit margins looks to speed up delivery times and tamp down its growing multi-billion dollar logistics bill.

Logistics Service Providers have profited from aligning themselves with the e-commerce giant’s rapid growth, however, as Amazon evolves, many LSPs risk being left with their head in the sand.

From its inception as an online book retailer, to being the world’s biggest e-commerce company, Amazon’s influence and control over the sector has been almost absolute.

Amazon's ambition to build a global shipping and logistics business to compete directly with UPS and Fedex seems to be much bigger than what most people thought, according to leaked documents discovered by Bloomberg.

Many industry players and experts are waiting anxiously to see what innovations Amazon will come up with next – and above all, whether Amazon will enter into delivery logistics under its own banner.

Amazon plans to open between 300 and 400 bricks-and-mortar bookstores, according to comments made by a US shopping mall CEO.

As an industry, logistics is ripe for technology-driven disruption, and no company is better at leveraging technology to broaden margins than Amazon - logistics and delivery companies should be tracking these early days of Amazon‘s logistics play like hawks.

Analysts questioned the company's plans about making heavy investments in logistics, even at the expense of profits, and wondered why they were planning to buy more assets like trucks, and lease jets to take on shippers like UPS and FedEx.

2015 was a record year for job creation by Amazon in Europe with over 10,000 new permanent jobs, bringing the company’s total European workforce to over 40,000 - Amazon has invested over €15 billion in Europe since 2010 on infrastructure and operations and fulfillment.

As the data on sales continues to be made public by retailers of all types and sizes, we can expect debates at this month’s NRF conference, and way beyond, about what happened over the 2015 holiday season.