Amazon has insisted, even to Congress, that it does not use its third-party sellers' data to inform development of competing products. But through interviews with more than 20 former employees and an analysis of documents, The Wall Street Journal has concluded that's not true.
Amazon's business relies on third-party retailers, who either stock products at an Amazon warehouse or sell them directly from their own shelves through the e-commerce giant's online marketplace. And like many big box stores, Amazon often creates versions of those products sold under its brand name, though Amazon associate general counsel Nate Sutton said in congressional testimony last year that "we don't use individual seller data directly to compete" with third-party sellers, and the company maintains it has rules against accessing that data.
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