Amazon Continues its Million Dollar Investments
Within the past year, Amazon has announced several major investments in international companies. Because the company never does anything small, it has invested millions of dollars in these companies, representing billions of dollars in total. Many of the new investments have been focused on delivery businesses and logistics. However, they have invested in other projects as well, such as their new headquarters. No one can ever accuse the largest online internet company of not being ambitious.
Here are a few of Amazon’s most high-profile investments over the last year:
PillPack
Back in June of 2018, Amazon announced its purchase of online pharmacy PillPack. This was later revealed to be a $753 million purchase. This came along with Amazon’s growing interest in health care, as it joined a partnership to cut the costs of its employee’s healthcare. This investment expanded beyond just healthcare costs into PillPack’s medication delivery and ability to remind users to take their medicine.
HQ2
Amazon announced its next funding into their second headquarter in November of 2018. The $5 billion investment was split between the Northern Virginia and New York locations. However, after backing out of the New York location, it declared its plans to move forward with the Northern Virginia headquarters. With this also came the $230 million investment for the new Operations Center of Excellence in Nashville. In addition to both these investments, the company plans to create 17 corporate offices and tech hubs in North America as well.
Aurora
In February of the new 2019 year, Amazon pledged its investment in the self-driving car company, Aurora. With Amazon’s investment, Aurora was able to collect $530 million in funding in conjunction with other investors such as Sequoia and Shell.
Rivian
Barely a week after the previous investment, Amazon invested $700 million investment the electric truck start-up, Rivian. The announcement came with Amazon’s worldwide consumer CEO, Jeff Wilke’s statement, “We’re inspired by Rivian’s vision for the future of electric transportation.”
Amazon Air
The company expanded its financing in transportation and logistics through the expansion of Amazon Air. This will include 50 planes and new regional hubs. The company stated its plans to open a new hub in Kentucky in 2021.
Project Kuiper
It is widely known that Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has a great interest in space. This year, Amazon announced its plans to set up a network of over 3,000 satellites beyond the atmosphere with Project Kuiper. The goal is to expand high-speed internet access across the world. Exact cost estimates were not provided for the project.
Deliveroo
Most recently, Amazon led a $575 million investment in the food delivery company, Deliveroo. This London-based company operates in 14 countries throughout Europe as well as other continents. Deliveroo CEO Will Shu said the money is intended to go toward the company’s new initiatives to grow Deliveroo’s engineering team to focus on new products.
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