General
Amazon is rumoured to be interested in acquiring (a part of) American department store chain JCPenney, which has been granted protection against creditors and is currently looking for a solution for its deep financial problems.
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Amazon can get back to work in France: the online retailer has reached an agreement with the unions on a phased restart of its distribution centres, after five weeks of inactivity.
Schwarz Group, the parent company of German discounter Lidl, is launching its own cloud services, which will compete directly with Amazon's Web Services. The distribution group already has Rewe and Siemens as customers, and now wants to turn its IT services into a strategic branch of the company.
Despite record sales of 75.5?billion dollars (69?billion euros), Amazon fears a loss of 1.5?billion dollars (1.3?billion euros) in the second quarter due to extra costs to combat covid-19.
Amazon does not comply with French anti-coronavirus regulations, a French Court of Appeal has now confirmed. Although the online giant is still allowed to ship essential products from French warehouses, they are all closed for the time being.
Amazon appears to use data of the third-party vendors on its platform to develop its own competing products, although the company denies this claim. Meanwhile, Jeff Bezos has decided to take management back into his own hands during this corona crisis.
Food
The British competition watchdog CMA has given Amazon the go-ahead to invest in Deliveroo, to avoid the possible bankruptcy of the meal delivery company because of the coronavirus crisis.
E-commerce giant Amazon will completely close its French distribution centres for a week, This decision follows a court ruling prohibiting the online retailer from selling products other than those deemed essential, as it would not take sufficient measures against Covid-19.?
A French judge has limited Amazon to selling essential goods only, as long as the company cannot guarantee the safety of its employees in the distribution centres.
The current crisis is forcing us, retailers, to take a break and look in the mirror: are we still relevant, do we still see opportunities, do we still want to invest, do we still feel the drive to get back to work?
Ahold Delhaize's non-food webshop bol.com is due to open its French version in June, starting its offensive in Brussels and Wallonia. On its annual general meeting, the Dutch retail group also approved a prolonged Belgian presence in its supervisory board.
Electronics
Amazon has decided to delay its annual discount day Prime Day due to the corona crisis, a decision that may cost the company some 300?million dollars (270?million euros).
Cosmetics
Amazoncan not be held responsible for the sale of counterfeit products on its platform, the Court of Justice of the European Union decided in a case brought before it by cosmetics brand Coty.
During the current corona crisis, Amazon is only allowing the most necessary supplies into its American and European warehouses. The online retailer wants to keep space free for medical and urgent products.
The arrival of Amazon in the Benelux is causing a landslide. Experts take a gloomy view: an immeasurable product range, very low prices and the cheap Prime membership are the ingredients of a deadly efficient ecosystem. What can local players do against that?
As of today, customers in the Benelux can visit amazon.nl for a range of more than one hundred million products in more than thirty categories. Before today, amazon.nl only sold books and Kindles; the Dutch had to go to the German site for the full product range.
