In 2017, Amazon acquired Whole Foods (WF) for $13.7 billion. Amazon started as an online bookseller and now sells all types of products online. Why would Amazon purchase a bricks and mortar food supermarket? In your explanation, describe the various forms of corporate strategy and explain which one is Amazon following? Next, what corporate strategy did Amazon pursue? (Be very specific and explain the reason for your selection.) What benefits do you think Amazon hoped to gain from this acquisition? What benefits did Whole Foods gain? Since this acquisition, is Whole Foods meeting the expectations of Amazon? Does/did the pandemic impact your assessment of the acquisition of WF?
What is the "Amazon Fresh" initiative? Why did Amazon start Amazon Fresh? Is this initiative following the same corporate strategy that they pursued when acquiring Whole Foods? Or does it indicate a change? If you had the opportunity, would you have recommended to top management to acquire Whole Foods? (Some info in Resources but you need to conduct your own research to answer some of these questions. Go to chapter 7 for info about corporate strategy. Remember that you need to be very specific about which corporate strategy. For example, what kind of stability, growth, portfolio, etc.... Sample sentence: Amazon is following a Directional retrenchment corporate strategy that will result in a divestment of Amazon's assets. The reason for this is blah.....[this is not a true statement-LR])