Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Walmart to Vendors: Get Off Amazon's Cloud (wsj.com)

Posted by msmash on from the tussle-continues dept.

Amazon vs. Walmart saga continues. It turns out, Walmart isn't thrilled about its partners using Amazon's cloud, and it's telling them to get off it (alternative source). From a report: Walmart is telling some technology companies that if they want its business, they can't run applications for the retailer on Amazon's leading cloud-computing service, Amazon Web Services, several tech companies say. [...] Walmart, loath to give any business to Amazon, said it keeps most of its data on its own servers and uses services from emerging AWS competitors, such as Microsoft's Azure.

5 of 173 comments (clear)

  1. Shock Horror! by hackel · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Huh, Walmart is being a complete monopolistic dick? Sure didn't see that one coming...

    1. Re:Shock Horror! by FooAtWFU · · Score: 5, Insightful

      No!!! This is not about it being a monopoly; if anything, this is about Wal-Mart as monopsony, a single buyer. It's different.

      --
      The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
    2. Re: Shock Horror! by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The history of how Walmart crushed Kmart and other competitors is interesting. Walmart was very innovative, and used technology to streamline their supply chain, cut shrinkage, avoid surplus inventory, etc. This let them cut prices below what their competitors could charge.

      They also used tech to forecast demand and improve sales-per-customer. Before Walmart, a department store would have a "men's accessories" section with ties, belts, socks, etc. But then Walmart scrutinized checkout data and make the SHOCKING discovery that people don't buy ties, belts, and socks together. They buy ties with shirts, belts with pants, and socks with shoes. Who would have guessed? So Walmart reconfigured their sales floors to put the belts next to the pants, the ties next to the dress shirts, and the socks near the shoes. The result? Increased sales.

  2. Companies aren't looking before they leap by zerofoo · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Companies need to be very careful about what data is being stored in someone else's datacenter.

    I'm sure if enough of Walmart's suppliers store enough data in AWS, Amazon could get some tremendous insights into Walmart's supply chain.

    In my opinion too many companies have rushed to the cloud and have not completely thought out the repercussions of that choice. If your data is stored in AWS or Azure is it really your data? What if the Government decides to subpoena your data and your company decides to fight the subpoena, but Amazon decides it isn't worth the trouble - and they hand over your data?

    The day of reckoning is coming for cloud services and it won't be technical that brings the pain - it will be legal.

  3. Re: Fuck Walmart by RabidReindeer · · Score: 4, Insightful

    covfefe