Amazon confirms it sells hardware at cost, not making money on it

10comments
Amazon confirms it sells hardware at cost, not making money on it
The Amazon Kindle Fire kickstarted the niche of $199 7-inch tablets that has grown tremendously since then. But if you think that Amazon reaps huge margins out of the device, you’d be wrong.

Amazon lastly unveiled its second wave of Kindle tablets under the Fire HD brand. All of them come with high-resolution screens with prices starting from $199 for the 7-inch model, and $299 for the 8.9-inch device.

"Basically, we sell the hardware at our cost, so it is break even on the hardware," Bezos said in an interview for the BBC. "We're not trying to make money on the hardware."

So where does Amazon makes its profits from? Obviously, it works similarly to the way Google does with Android by releasing the world’s most popular operating system for free. In this case, Amazon doesn’t do it for the ads, but for user engagement into its ecosystem. That model is hardly making it much money, but revenues are growing and some people like Google chairman Eric Schmidt actually think it’s one of the big four along with Google, Apple and Facebook.

source: BBC

$5/mo off for 5 years on Visible premium plans

$30 /mo
$35
$5 off (14%)
New members get $5/mo off the $35/mo Visible+ plan or $5/mo off the $45/mo Visible+ Pro plan for the first 60 months when they port-in from an eligible carrier. Use code 5OFF5 at checkout to save up to $300.
Buy at Visible
Google News Follow
Follow us on Google News

Recommended For You

COMMENTS (10)
FCC OKs Cingular\'s purchase of AT&T Wireless