4 ms·
> I've been concerned with endless VC funding for years. Their goal is to build monopolies by out-funding every other entrant in the space. Reid Hoffman calls
by burtonator 7y ago
> I've been concerned with endless VC funding for years.
Their goal is to build monopolies by out-funding every other entrant in the space.
Reid Hoffman calls it blitzscaling.
- konschubert 7y agoIt doesn't work if you don't build a moat.
- usefulcat 7y agoThat tends to not work so well when the product is a commodity.
- runako 7y agoIt worked for Amazon.
- konschubert 7y agoAmazon's warehouses and logistics network provides scale effects that create a moat.
- runako 7y agoContemporaneously, this was not seen as an advantage. Notoriously, Webvan invested heavily in these two line items and didn't get any moat from them.
- bsder 7y agoAmazon had a 5-10% pricing advantage for years over everybody else because nobody was paying sales tax on their purchased items. Uber and Lyft do not have that kind of advantage.
- runako 7y agoIt's funny you say that. I've been having discussions with people who are making the claim that Uber & Lyft have an unfair pricing advantage because VCs are subsidizing them, and because they have ignored local licensing rules.
- SkyPuncher 7y agoAmazon is the single successor out of many, similar failed attempts - including many that were arguably "better".
- mimixco 7y agoAmazon innovated with better logistics, a smarter UI, and robots -- all hard and expensive problems to solve. Uber's "innovation" consists of a simple and easily replicated app.
- runako 7y agoThat's all in place now. None of that was in place enough to be a profitable competitive advantage by 2004, 10 years after Amazon was founded. (Uber is 10 years old.) The first 10 years of Amazon were blitzscaling at all costs (or as they said at the time "Get Big Fast!").