Brad Stone, the author of "Amazon Unbound", joined to talk about Elon Musk (09:44), Amazon's workplace environment (23:25), the importance of Prime (27:17), which tech companies are most dangerous for society (51:13), & more!
Brad Stone joins us to discuss the making of the modern Amazon, and how it's morphed from the "flywheel company" of The Everything Store into a set of interlocking and self-reinforcing businesses that extended both wider and deeper into the global economy than anyone ever imagined. (except perhaps Jeff Bezos) Is Amazon the Standard Oil of our time, or maybe something much, much bigger? Tune in as we dive in! Sponsors: Anthropic: https://bit.ly/acquiredclaude25 Sentry: https://bit.ly/acquiredsentry WorkOS: https://acquired.fm/unpluggedPlaying Cards: https://bit.ly/workOSshop (Code: ACQDECK) Statsig: https://bit.ly/acquiredstatsig26 More Acquired! Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes Join the Slack Subscribe to ACQ2 Merch Store! © Copyright 2015-2026 ACQ, LLC Topics covered: When and why Brad decided The Everything Store needed a sequel The process of writing the book and access he got at Amazon, including S-Team executives like Dave Clark The evolution of Amazon's core strategy from the flywheel into a set of "interlocking and self-reinforcing businesses", and how Brad landed on that as the key theme for the book Amazon's culture and the evolution from "Jeff-bots", and its embodiment in S-team members and company leaders beyond Amazon's investments in Video and why Bezos was ahead of the pack in realizing its strategic importance (including the rumored as-of-recording MGM deal) Amazon's secretive "Campfire" event and why Amazon does it despite its very un-Amazon price tag Brad's take on the future of three major Amazon business lines: Video, International and Marketplace / 3rd Party Sellers Amazon and Bezos's intense focus on competitors, despite the "theater" of their mantra to only focus on customers The Bezos "lapses of judgment" in 2018-19 and what it was like reporting on all the craziness around it Tracking down the "voice of Alexa" Nina Rolle, and Bezos's relationship with Elon! Links: Amazon Unbound (on Amazon, natch): https://www.amazon.com/Amazon-Unbound-Invention-Global-Empire/dp/1982132612/
Brad Stone is the author of Amazon Unbound, a new book about the inner workings of Amazon, which releases this week. Stone joins Big Technology Podcast to discuss the book, Bezos's transformation, Amazon's culture, and what's in store for the company now that Bezos is leaving the CEO role. Check out our sponsor, Flatfile: https://flatfile.io Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Kara and Scott recap Elon Musk's host appearance on Saturday Night Live and how it affected the cryptocurrency market. They also discuss a major cyberattack on a US natural gas pipeline. Then we are joined by author of the new book Amazon Unbound, Brad Stone, to discuss how Amazon is changing in the post-Bezos era. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
About Brad Author and Senior Executive Editor, Bloomberg Technology Brad Stone is the author of four books, including Amazon Unbound: Jeff Bezos and the Invention of a Global Empire,published by Simon & Schuster in May 2021. It traces the transformation of Amazon into one of the largest and most feared companies of the world and the accompanying emergence of Jeff Bezos as the richest man alive. Brad is also the author of The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon, which chronicled the foundational early years of the company and its founder. The book, a New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller, was translated into more than 35 languages and won the 2013 Financial Times/Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award. In 2017, he also published The Upstarts: Uber, Airbnb, and the Battle for the New Silicon Valley. Brad is Senior Executive Editor for Global Technology at Bloomberg News where he oversees a team of 65 reporters and editors that covers high-tech companies, startups, cyber security and internet trends around the world. Over the last ten years, as a writer for Bloomberg Businessweek, he’s authored over two dozen cover stories on companies such as Apple, Google, Amazon, Softbank, Twitter, Facebook and the Chinese internet juggernauts Didi, Tencent and Baidu. He’s a regular contributor to Bloomberg’s technology newsletter Fully Charged, and to the daily Bloomberg TV news program, Bloomberg Technology. He was previously a San Francisco-based correspondent for The New York Times and Newsweek. A graduate of Columbia University, he is originally from Cleveland, Ohio and lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife and three daughters Links: The Everything Store: https://www.amazon.com/Everything-Store-Jeff-Bezos-Amazon/dp/0316219282/ Amazon Unbound: https://www.amazon.com/Amazon-Unbound-Invention-Global-Empire/dp/1982132612/ Andy Jassy book review: https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R1Q4CQQV1ALSN0/ref=cm_cr_getr_d_rvw_ttl?ie=UTF8&ASIN=B00FJFJOLC
Topics covered include: The global surge in 2012 of entrepreneurs starting ridesharing companies, nowhere moreso than China Didi CEO Cheng Wei and investor Wang Gang’s backgrounds at Alibaba, first entrepreneurial effort in Momo, and Momo’s pivot to Didi Dache The culling of the ridesharing herd in China down to Didi Dache and Kuaidi Dache through brutal competition and involvement of the “big three” Chinese internet companies Rise of the Chinese messaging apps and associated mobile payments, and their impact on ridesharing The 2015 merger between Didi and Kuaidi, brokered in part by Russian VC Yuri Milner Uber’s decision to enter the Chinese market, and early success with investment and support from Baidu The first meeting between Uber CEO Travis Kalanick and Cheng Wei in 2015—which does not go well Subsequent “scorched earth” competition between Didi and Uber throughout 2015-16 Negotiating an armistice: Uber’s agreement to sell its Chinese operations to Didi in late 2016 End of the war, or just the beginning? January 2017: Didi invests $100M in Brazilian Uber competitor 99 Sustainable growth, and building moats versus scorching earth Sponsors: Anthropic: https://bit.ly/acquiredclaude25 Sentry: https://bit.ly/acquiredsentry WorkOS: https://acquired.fm/unpluggedPlaying Cards: https://bit.ly/workOSshop (Code: ACQDECK) Statsig: https://bit.ly/acquiredstatsig26 Followups: Stay tuned for real-time coverage of the Snap IPO coming here on Acquired! The Carve Out: Ben: Taming the Mammoth on Wait But Why David: Conversations with Tyler Podcast by Tyler Cowen, co-author of the Marginal Revolution blog Brad: Yuval Noah Harari (author of Sapiens)’s new book, Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow More Acquired! Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes Join the Slack Subscribe to ACQ2 Merch Store! © Copyright 2015-2026 ACQ, LLC