With iRobot, it would gain one more building block for the ultimate smart home - and, of course, more data.Ĭustomers can opt out of having iRobot devices store a layout of their homes, according to the vacuum maker. In the last few years, the company purchased the Wi-Fi startup Eero and partnered with the construction company Lennar to offer tech-powered houses. Amazon has attempted to assuage such fears.Īmazon - like any company - aims to grow. At select Amazon stores and Whole Foods, the company is testing a palm-scanning technology that allows customers to pay for items by storing biometric data in the cloud, sparking concerns about risks of a data breach. Ring, which Amazon purchased in 2018 for $1 billion, monitors doors at homes and helps police track down crime - even when users might not be aware.
smart speaker market, accounting for roughly 70% of sales, according to estimates by Consumer Intelligence Research Partners. Meanwhile, its Echo devices, which house the voice assistant Alexa, have dominated the U.S. e-commerce market, allowing it to gather granular data about the shopping preferences of millions of Americans and more worldwide. Some estimates show that the retail giant controls 38% of the U.S. along with the privacy issues come the antitrust issues, because it’s buying market share.”Īmazon’s reach goes well beyond that. “Its obvious intent, through all the other products that it sells to consumers, is to be in your home. “It’s acquiring this vast set of data that Roomba collects about people’s homes,” said Ron Knox, an Amazon critic who works for the antimonopoly group Institute for Local Self-Reliance. The latest line of Roombas, for example, employ sensors that map and remember a home’s floor plan.
This time, the company is targeting healthcare, through its $3.9-billion buyout of the primary care company One Medical, and the “smart home,” planning to expand its already mighty presence with a $1.7-billion merger with iRobot, maker of the popular Roomba vacuum.Īmazon is known for its vast collection of consumer information, so both mergers have heightened privacy concerns about how it gathers data and what it does with the information. In recent weeks, Amazon has said it will spend billions of dollars on two gigantic acquisitions that, if approved, will broaden its ever-growing presence in the lives of consumers.
From what you buy online to how you remember tasks to when you monitor your front door - Amazon is seemingly everywhere.Īnd it appears the company doesn’t want to halt its reach anytime soon.
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