If 90% of retail stores were Walmart because they owned a significant percentage of real-estate in key markets (thus, preventing other retailers from moving in), then their Great Value offerings would also be anti-competitive.
Amazon's behavior is a textbook anti-competition. They literally build copies of products offered by other merchants on their site, then rank them higher in search results, often times, driving the merchants out of business.
That's just incorrect. There's nothing wrong with controlling 100% of the market share, as long as you don't use your position to illegally prevent competition.
> Amazon's behavior is a textbook anti-competition.
That completely counters the point you just made. Amazon accounts for maybe 5% of retail sales, and Walmart is closer to 15%. Even in the eCommerce market their share is around 50%. Vastly lower than the 90% you threw out there.
> They literally build copies of products offered by other merchants on their site
Every retail company does this through suppliers. It's called "white label" and it's an industry standard. And Amazon does not build them, they license another companies product.
> then rank them higher in search results,
Citation needed.
> often times, driving the merchants out of business.
Again, citation needed. Particularly the "often times".
Which is why I said, literally, "their behavior crosses into anti-competitive." You can compete with vendors, or you can control most of the market. But you can't do both: control the market, then use that advantage to drive competition out of business.
> Even in the eCommerce market their share is around 50%.
50% is a staggeringly high market share. For reference, Toyota has less than 10% market share.
> Citation needed.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-04-20/got-a-hot...
http://fortune.com/2016/04/20/amazon-copies-merchants/
> And Amazon does not build them, they license another companies product.
Those companies are accusing amazon of literally copying their unique products. We're not talking about buying batteries or something from a supplier. Amazon is literally copying existing products that do well.
Here's an ex-employee discussing the topic:
> Amazon sees your product is doing very well, they have the retained performance data, and Amazon copies to their best of their ability as a “generic version.” Through subtle advertising, and imitations of the successful attributes of your product, their product cuts straight to the top ranked in your categories.
https://www.skubana.com/the-best-kept-secrets-of-amazons-ama...
Yes, and I'm saying that it isn't true. Merely owning majority market share doesn't make a company anti-competitive. Anti-competitive behavior does. And while it takes the latter following the former to work, it certainly isn't guaranteed.
> You can compete with vendors, or you can control most of the market. But you can't do both: control the market, then use that advantage to drive competition out of business.
They absolutely can drive competition out of business as long as they aren't using their position to do so illegally. Gmail shut down a lot of email providers, not through anti-competitive behavior but through providing a more compelling product. Amazon has yet to successfully drive any supplier out of business. There's an argument that they broke Toys R Us, but that wasn't anti-competitive, that was through introducing toys that weren't severely overpriced. Walmart assisted with that.
> 50% is a staggeringly high market share. For reference, Toyota has less than 10% market share.
Toyota is in a nearly 100 year old industry which has multiple multi-national companies competing. iRobot has a 62% market share but nobody is looking to take down big vacuum.
50% market share of a sub-market within a major market is a weak argument. While they have 50% of online market share, they have something like 9% of actual retail sales, which is considerably less than Walmart.
> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-04-20/got-a-hot....
> http://fortune.com/2016/04/20/amazon-copies-merchants/
Your argument was that Amazon ranks them higher in search results. Both of these articles are discussing Amazon using white-label suppliers to build competing products. That's not the same thing. Every major retailer has been building white-label and private-label products for decades.
> Those companies are accusing amazon of literally copying their unique products.
You'll notice what they aren't doing is suing Amazon for patent-infringement. The very article you posted shows that while Amazon makes competing products, they don't violate patents.
> Amazon is literally copying existing products that do well.
No they are making competing products. That's not copying, that's called "competition".
> their product cuts straight to the top ranked in your categories.
That should have been a very clear indicator for you, but you kind of missed the point. Amazon doesn't rank their products higher. The ranking algorithm is generic, and largely tied to top selling items in a category. When you see two products that are very similar, and one is half the cost of the other, you buy the cheaper market.
It seems, to me at least, your issue isn't Amazon. Your issue is the consumer market doing exactly what it's always done.
