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Uhh try going to a VC to raise money with the Jeff Bezos story today: "We're going to lose money for five years and then operate at absurdly low margins for et
by josh2600 13y ago
Uhh try going to a VC to raise money with the Jeff Bezos story today:
"We're going to lose money for five years and then operate at absurdly low margins for eternity".
Look, Amazon may win in the long run, but asking why more companies aren't like amazon is like asking why every company isn't Apple. We can't all be outliers.
- DrinkWater 13y agoOr you could simply say: People who invest money are rarely committed to long-term strategies. And Amazons definition of long-term is very unique.
- seunosewa 13y agoInvestors don't have a problem with long term strategies. They have a problem with strategies that involve losing money consistently or making no profits for many years, in the hope that you can magically start making obscene profits sometime in the distant future. Most companies that practice this kind of long term strategy end up going bankrupt before the profits materialise, so it makes sense for investors to be wary of them. Warren Buffett is a long term investor, and even he would not touch Amazon's stock with a 10 foot pole.
- DrinkWater 13y agoBut Amazon is not "Most companies". Amazon has done a brilliant job so far, and has changed from a bookstore to a cloud-provider, mega store, content generator and ad network (and probably many things more); utilizing the medium "internet" in a way most companies can only dream of. In my opinion, like i said, Amazon has a very unique POV on long-term strategies and it collides with people (or stock markets) expectations on making a lot of money in a short time.
- fragmede 13y agoJeff Bezos, and by extension Amazon's definition of long-term is exceedingly long; 10,000 years kind of long. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clock_of_the_Long_Now http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clock_of_the_Long_Now