> American companies aren't diversified in the same way because investors realized that breaking up a conglomerate maximizes the stock prices
Is Google or Amazon not at the conglomerate level yet? Is it simply because their services and products are all on the internet?
I've seen the trend go the opposite direction - conglomerates are in now, because they give you nice steady dividends and less shock when one part of the company is failing. If not for AWS, where would AMZN stock be today? I've seen no serious effort on the investor level to break up these companies, and practically none politically (fledgeling movements on the far ends of the spectrum).
Don't Google and Amazon still make substantially all their revenue from a single business? I could see that changing for Google if they're successful with self-driving cars.
The pressure to break up a conglomerate comes from outside investors who don't have a stake in running the businesses. There have been hostile takeovers motivated completely by the anticipated profit from a breakup. I don't see that happening for either Google or Amazon.
> AWS is already a large and fast growing business.
But isn't AWS the same as Amazon, just instead of selling a new vacuum, its selling cloud compute? Its still e-commerce, just rebranded as "cloud provider."
- Billing: One bills you before shipping, the other bills at the end of the month.
- Cart: One lets you add items to a cart, the other lets you use products via API.
- Delivery: One requires warehouses all over the world, the other requires data centers all over the world. Only warehouses and data centers are so specialized that they aren't interchangeable.
- 3rd parties: One is a platform for creating online storefronts where 3rd parties can sell. The other is a platform that runs any code you want.
- One has a mass market audience of consumers, the other has a highly specialized market of developers.
Hmm, on second thought, maybe they are not the same business.
Is Google or Amazon not at the conglomerate level yet? Is it simply because their services and products are all on the internet?
I've seen the trend go the opposite direction - conglomerates are in now, because they give you nice steady dividends and less shock when one part of the company is failing. If not for AWS, where would AMZN stock be today? I've seen no serious effort on the investor level to break up these companies, and practically none politically (fledgeling movements on the far ends of the spectrum).