Amazon launches Storefronts catering to small businesses
Amazon wants you to shop small.The online retailer launched a new section of its site Monday called Amazon Storefronts, which only lists products sold by small- and medium-sized businesses in the U.S.The company says smaller companies can get lost among its millions of goods and it wants a way for shoppers to find them more easily.
What's in the Amazon box? Maybe a real 7-foot Christmas tree
Watch out for the 7-foot box on the doorstep. Amazon plans to sell and ship fresh, full-size Christmas trees this year.
Park, load, go: Amazon brings grocery pickup to Whole Foods
Amazon, known for bringing items to shoppers' homes, is adding a curbside pickup option at Whole Foods for Prime members.
Amazon removes Nazi-themed items after complaints
Amazon says it has removed items with Nazi or white supremacist symbols from its website after criticism from advocacy groups.
Amazon facial recognition matched members of Congress with mugshots, ACLU says
A facial recognition software from Amazon falsely matched multiple members of Congress with mugshots, according to research from the American Civil Liberties Union.
Amazon's Prime Day runs into early snags
Amazon's website ran into some early snags Monday on its much-hyped Prime Day, an embarrassment for the tech company on the shopping holiday it created.
Prime time: A day of deals at Amazon, and at its rivals
Amazon is extending its annual "Prime Day" promotion to 36 hours this year and will try to lure more deal-seekers to the aisles of Whole Foods. Shoppers will have plenty of sales to choose from as other retailers offer promotions to try to take a share of the spending.
Starting this week, Prime members will get discounts at all Whole Foods stores
Amazon Prime member savings will be available in all Whole Foods Market and Whole Foods Market 365 stores nationwide beginning Wednesday, June 27, providing even more opportunities for Prime members to save at the nation’s leading natural and organic grocer.
After Amazon Echo misfire, ways to protect your own privacy
NEW YORK -- Revelations that an Amazon Echo smart speaker inadvertently sent a family's private conversation to an acquaintance highlights some unexpected risks of new voice-enabled technologies.According to Amazon, the fault was an "unlikely" series of inadvertent vocal cues that triggered the speaker, caused it to begin recording and then led it to interpret subsequent conversation as a "send message" request.There's no way to eliminate these sorts of privacy risks short of unplugging entirely.
Amazon halts plans to build Seattle office tower as city weighs controversial business tax
Amazon on Wednesday said it was pausing construction on a new office tower in downtown Seattle while the city debates a controversial “progressive tax on business.” The projects they've paused would bring 7,000+ new jobs to the Seattle, plus the construction related jobs.
Amazon expansion includes new office, 2K jobs in Boston
BOSTON -- Amazon unveiled plans on Tuesday for a major expansion in Boston's Seaport District, promising 2,000 new technology jobs even as the city remains in contention for the company's coveted second headquarters.Seattle-based Amazon announced it would move into a 430,000-square-foot "Tech Hub" in 2021, and said the new jobs would be created in fields including machine learning, speech science, cloud computing, and robotics.The company currently has about 1,200 workers in the city, according to Rohit Prasad, a Boston-based vice president and head scientist of Amazon Alexa.
Amazon cuts a deal with Best Buy, broadens global reach
SEATTLE -- Amazon is expanding its dominance globally by giving overseas customers access to more than 45 million items via its app.The online powerhouse also announced Wednesday that it's teaming with rival Best Buy on new Fire TV Edition smart TVs.Amazon.com Inc.'s "International Shopping" will be available through a mobile browser or app and goods will be shipped globally from the United States.
On Medicaid? Amazon offers recipients a Prime discount
SEATTLE -- Amazon has taken another step to woo low-income shoppers to its site and away from rival Walmart.The online retailer opened up its $5.99-a-month discounted Prime membership to people on Medicaid Wednesday, giving Amazon an even bigger pool of potential shoppers who may otherwise have been unable to pay the standard fee.
Couple worried mystery Amazon packages could be tied to international 'brushing' scam
FOLSOM, Calif. -- A Northern California couple say they are concerned about mysterious packages that keep showing up at their doorstep.Michelle Carroll told KTXL it all started a few weeks ago when she and her husband received a stuffed, talking hamster.
Amazon laying off hundreds of corporate employees in Seattle
SEATTLE -- In a rare cutback, Amazon is reportedly laying off hundreds of corporate employees at its Seattle headquarters.According to our news partner The Seattle Times, hundreds of others in Amazon's global operations will also face layoffs.
UPS, FedEx fall on report Amazon readying delivery service
Shares of FedEx and UPS slipped following a media report that Amazon.com is readying its own air delivery service, meaning not only that the companies may see diminished business from a massive client, but that they might have to compete against it.Rumors have swirled for some time that Amazon has explored bringing some of its delivery services in house to take control of the process and avoid delays often seen around the holidays.UPS was caught off-guard by the crush of online shopping leading up to the recent holiday season and said this month that it must spend a chunk of its tax-cut savings to improve its package-delivery network.On Friday The Wall Street Journal, citing anonymous sources, said that Amazon is planning a new service called "Shipping With Amazon" that will allow it to pick up packages from businesses and deliver them to consumers.
Couple inundated with mystery packages from Amazon wants it to stop
ACTON, Mass. -- A Massachusetts couple says it was fun when they started receiving free mystery packages from Amazon they hadn't ordered.Now they want it to stop.Mike and Kelly Gallivan, of Acton, tell The Boston Globe the first package arrived in October.
Amazon to pay France $250 million in back taxes
PARIS -- Online retailer Amazon has reached a deal with French authorities to pay about $250 million in back taxes.Amazon was asked in 2012 to pay the amount over earnings made in 2006-2010 and has since been involved in a dispute with tax authorities.Details of the deal have not been revealed.The company said Monday it has reached an "overall settlement agreement with the French tax authorities on past issues, and our main objective remains to provide the best possible buying experience for our customers in France, where we have invested more than 2 billion euros since 2010, and created more than 5,500 permanent jobs."Amazon last year reached a similar deal with Italian authorities to end a 100-million-euro ($118 million) dispute over its tax payments from 2011-15.