After mothballing Amazon Care, Amazon reenters tele-health with Amazon Clinic, a marketplace for third-party virtual consultants

The ink is not yet dry on Amazon’s $4 billion acquisition of OneMedical, but in the meantime, the online services giant is making one more move into telehealth, and into medical services overall, on its own steam. The company today is taking the wraps off of Amazon Clinic, which Amazon describes as a virtual health “storefront”: users can search for, connect with, and pay for telehealth care, addressing variety of conditions that are some of the more popular for telehealth consultations today.

Amazon Clinic is initially launching in 32 states in the U.S.. It does not work with health insurance and this point, and overall pricing will vary depending on providers, conditions, and location. (One example, connecting with a clinic for acne treatment in Nevada will cost around $40, and you get a choice of two providers whose different offers are provided in a comparative table. Another example, for pink eye (conjunctivitis) in New Jersey, has a wider price gap of between $30 and $48 between the two providers listed.)

Amazon Clinic appeared to leak out about a week ago when users spotted a video on YouTube that was then quickly removed as media picked up on the attention. Now, it is launching officially, and at a critical moment.


It’s only been a few months since Amazon shut down Amazon Care, which had been a telehealth service that it created for its own employees before stepping up plans to launch it nationwide and to third-party companies. And more generally, the company is, like many others in tech, feeling the economic pinch. It is reportedly gearing up to make a big round of layoffs, potentially 10,000 jobs and possibly this week; and additionally to that it’s been downsizing and cutting a number of its operations.

Amazon Clinic is about the company taking another pass at the healthcare market, and positioning itself as a player in what is a perpetual problem in the U.S.: how to bridge the gap between people needing medical help for ailments that are more complicated that a trip to the drug store, but might not justify expensive and time-consuming trips to the doctor.

(Other conditions it will cover addition to acne and pink eye include asthma refills, birth control, cold sores, dandruff, eczema, erectile dysfunction, eyelash growth, genital herpes, gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), hayfever, hyperlipidemia refills, hypertension refills, hypothyroidism refills, men’s hair loss, migraines, sinusitis, smoking cessation, urinary tract infections (UTIs), yeast infections and so on.)

Clinic is very much built in the Amazon mold. It’s a marketplace where third parties can leverage Amazon’s platform and reach to find customers, and Amazon can leverage third parties to quickly scale what offers to its consumers. And it helps Amazon extend the business funnel for other Amazon operations — in this case Amazon Pharmacy, which can fulfill any prescriptions that come out of Clinic consultations, and has reportedly not been as big of a boom in business as expected. (Users can fill Amazon Clinic scripts in other pharmacies, too.)


We’ve asked Amazon if it plans to provide its own in-house (private label, in e-commerce parlance) telehealth consultancy utalongside third parties, and what the plans are for further states, whether there are international ambitions, and if it will accept health insurance for Clinic in the future. It may well be that this is laying the groundwork for Amazon to link up what it is building here with OneMedical when that acquisition closes.


The bigger picture for Amazon Clinic is that the service will sit within Amazon’s bigger ambitions in the healthcare market. The company already has an online chemists, Amazon Pharmacy, which fulfills subscriptions and lets users additional buy over-the-counter drugs via Prime memberships that ship the items within two days.

Amazon also believes its new telehealth service addresses a gap in the market for providing users with health consultations for more minor ailments. Some situations need more direct physician involvement, which might be covered with One Medical or one’s existing healthcare coverage; some situations might be addressable by visiting a pharmacy on one’s own steam.

“But we also know that sometimes you just need a quick interaction with a clinician for a common health concern that can be easily addressed virtually,” the company noted in its blog post announcing the service.

Amazon has been making inroads, and laying out its ambitions, in healthcare for a number of years. Amazon Pharmacy was launched off the back of its acquisition of PillPack. And it’s been exploring healthcare as an enterprise opportunity, with integrations of Alexa into healthcare environments.


But Amazon Care is not the only step back it’s taken in its longer journey. In 2018, it formed a JV with JP Morgan and Berkshire Hathaway to build an employee healthcare operation, appointing a high-profile doctor to lead it. That service never appeared to take shape as expected and shut up shop in 2021.

We’ll update this piece as we learn more.

source: techcrunch.com

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Amazon wants to put microphones into your rings and glasses

At the end of its hardware event today, Amazon  announced a new program for testing and selling its own experimental, limited-volume hardware: Day 1 Editions.

The first of these new products is Echo Frames. These are Alexa-enabled glasses, though, unlike Google  Glass, there’s no camera and no display, just microphones and a speaker.

The second is the Echo Loop, a rather large Alexa-enabled ring with two built-in microphones and, of course, a tiny speaker. Both of these will be available on an invite-only basis and in limited volumes later this year.

The frames will retail for $179.99 and the Loop will cost $129.99 for the introduction period.

The glasses, which will sell without any prescription lenses (though you can add those if you want), weigh in at 31 grams. They aren’t especially stylish, though they look pretty acceptable.

The ring is maybe the oddest product Amazon demoed at its event today. It’s pretty large and I can’t quite see people talking into their rings and then listening to what Alexa has to say in response, but I could be wrong. Maybe it’s the next big thing.

“Paired with your phone, this ring lets you access information throughout the day,” Amazon writes. “It’s super easy to connect with Alexa without breaking stride or digging out your phone, for those simple things like turning on the lights or calculating the tip on your lunch bill. Simply press a button, talk softly to Alexa, and then the answer comes discretely through a small speaker built into the ring.”

To be fair, though, these are very much experimental products that are meant to allow Amazon to get feedback from real customers. But that’s what Amazon said about its Alexa-enabled microwave, too, and now it’s the best-selling microwave on the site.

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Amazon is selling its own private label diapers again, now under the Mama Bear brand

Amazon quietly launched its own private label diapers on its site last week, this time under the Mama Bear brand. The brand, which already sells other baby items like baby food and diaper pail refills, is now carrying size newborn through size 6 diapers. However, shoppers will have to request an invite to purchase the items, as they’re still being launched.

The arrival of Amazon’s own diaper brand follows reports from last year which claimed Amazon was planning to re-enter this market, after pulling its line of diapers sold under the Amazon Elements name back in January 2015.

While Amazon Elements continues to sell baby wipes, it more recently expanded to include vitamins and supplements – not other baby products.

But the success of Amazon’s baby wipes line may have rival diaper manufacturers fearing Amazon’s return to the market. Today, Amazon Elements wipes have achieved 14 percent market share, up from 9 to 10 percent since last year, notes the firm One Click Retail. Another brand, Water Wipes, have gained more market share in wipes, but Amazon Elements is the number 2 gainer, the firm said.



While still invite-only, Amazon’s new diapers area already proving to be a strong sales driver for the Mama Bear brand. The seven ASINs (Amazon Standard Identification Number, or basically, an Amazon SKU) for these new diapers have now accounted for 38 percent of the brand’s sales.

In addition, Amazon launched a new diaper pail refill ASIN around three months ago. On its own, it accounted for 41 percent of Mama Bear sales last week.

In other words, diapers and the diaper pail refill combined accounted for around 79 percent of Mama Bear sales last week.



While Mama Bear sales have spiked before – such as during Amazon’s sales holiday, Prime Week – the launch of the new private label diapers led to the largest sales spike the brand has ever seen last week, says One Click Retail CEO Spencer Millerberg.


Amazon’s investment in its private label lines has been exploding in recent months, including fashion, home, and other verticals. Its latest additions, reported this week, were new lines of activewear clothing, via brands called Goodsport, Rebel Canyon, and Peak Velocity. It also just entered the furniture market, with brands called Rivet and Stone & Beam, following earlier expansions into lingerie, shoes and handbags, and plus-size fashion.

A number of Amazon’s private labels today have seen millions, or even tens of millions or hundreds of millions in sales. A prior report from One Click Retail found the AmazonBasics line, for example, has over $250 million YTD, or 85 percent of total private brand sales in the U.S.

Meanwhile, Amazon’s apparel label Lark & Ro and its baby care and vitamins brand Amazon Elements have each grown 90 percent year-over-year, with respective sales of approximately $5 million and $10 million, the report said.

The new Mama Bear-branded diapers are being manufactured through Kimberly Clark, a source familiar with the situation says.

The diapers also come in two pattern options, white and a bears print, and are sold as 4-packs, with a varying amount per pack, depending on the diaper size. They’re competitively priced with leading brands: for example, 128 newborn diapers will sell for $25.49 when launched; 216 size 1 diapers are $38.49; 184 size 2 diapers are $39.69; and so on.

For comparison’s sake, 128 newborn Pampers Swaddlers are $26.28 and 216 size 1 Huggies Little Snugglers are $37.04 – to give you an idea of diaper pricing in general.

When comparing four sizes of Pampers Swaddlers that did have exact equivalent pack sizes to Mama Bear’s packs, Amazon’s brand saved shoppers 11 percent to 17 percent.

For Amazon, the addition of its own diapers and other private labels will have a bottom line impact, due to their increased margins. Plus, in some cases, the labels are used to drive customers to subscribe to Prime, as the brands themselves are Prime-only. So far that’s been the case for Mama Bear products, but the diapers aren’t yet labeled this way. However, that could be because they’re still in invite mode.

Source: TechCrunch

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Amazon launches Alexa-less Fire TV Stick for international users of its Prime video service

We’re approaching one year since Amazon expanded its Prime video service to over 200 countries internationally, and today the company is doubling down on that global audience with the introduction of a ‘Basic Edition’ of its popular Fire TV Stick that ships to over 100 countries.

The company unveiled a much-improved third-generation version of the product in September, adding HD support, but, like its predecessor, availability is limited to the U.S. initially with little chance of hitting much of the world. That’s an issue with Amazon wants to marry the dongle with Amazon Prime Video viewers outside of its strongest markets.

This new Basic Edition is essentially the previous incarnation of the device but without voice commands via Alexa. Alexa has been omitted altogether — you’ll note the lack of a voice command button on the remote. That’s because Alexa products aren’t yet available in many parts of the world, although Amazon has just begun to ship the Echo to India and Japan will follow soon as it bids to expand in Asia.

The Basic Edition, like the previous Fire TV Stick, comes with 720p and 1080p up to 60fps video output, Dolby Audio, a 1.3 GHz processor, 1 GB memory and 8 GB of storage for apps and games. The price is advertised as $50 — it may vary based on location — which is more than the new $39.99 model.


It may seem a little cheeky that Amazon is charging more for essentially less here — Alexa being the main difference — but this is the first time that a Fire TV Stick has been available for direct shipping to many parts of the world. So even if you wanted a superior model you’d end up paying more — both in terms of shipping cost, and the hassle of getting a product moved to your country of choice. This new version also includes free shipping, another small bonus.

It’s a logical move for Amazon because the Fire TV Stick can drive adoption of Prime Video, but for now but — if you live in a country where Amazon’s core e-commerce business and the remainder of the Prime membership services are not present — it isn’t exactly deal of the century. Google’s Chromecast, one of the closet like-for-like competitors, has local resale options world in some parts of the world but, for many, this new Basic Edition might be the most attractive dongle — even when it isn’t tied to Amazon’s full quota of Prime Video services.

“Last year, we made Amazon Prime Video available to customers globally, and today, we’re building on that momentum as we introduce Fire TV Stick Basic Edition to new customers around the world. This makes streaming content from apps like Prime Video fast and easy and we can’t wait to hear what customers think,” Marc Whitten, vice president of the Amazon Fire TV business, said in a statement.

Source: TechCrunch

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Amazon Launches App Engagement Reports, Allowing Appstore Developers To Track App Usage & Revenue

Continuing to grow its suite of services aimed at mobile app developers, Amazon today announced App Engagement Reports, free app usage reports that are now a part of the company’sMobile App Distribution Portal. The reports are designed for Amazon Appstore developers in need of information about app performance and revenue.

Specifically, the reports include daily and monthly active devices, installs, sessions, average revenue per device, and retention metrics, and they can be filtered by marketplace, viewed in chart form, or downloaded as a CSV, the company explains in this afternoon’s official announcement. Developers will also be able to change the data range on the reports in order to see historical trends.

There are six Engagement Reports now being provided:

• Overview: A summary of key usage data for your app or game
• Average Revenue: Daily and Monthly Average Revenue per Device (ARPD) and Average Revenue per Paid User (ARPPU) for In-App Items
• Retention: Daily Retention for days 1-3-7 and Weekly Retention for weeks 1-2-3
• Active Devices: Daily Active Devices (DAD), Monthly Active Devices (MAD), and Sticky Factor (DAD/MAD)
• Sessions: Total Daily Sessions and Average Sessions Per Device
• App Installs: Daily Installs and Uninstalls

At launch, the reports are only available for those apps that were submitted and published after October 25, 2012. For developers who haven’t updated their apps since then, they’ll need to either republish the app or submit an update in order to activate the reporting feature. However, there’s no need to make any other changes to the app’s code or integrate any additional software.

The report will include data for apps running on Amazon devices like the Kindle Fire and Fire HD, as well as any other Android devices running the latest version of the Amazon Appstore mobile app.

App analytics and sales figures are crucial to making Amazon’s Appstore a more complete service – these things have long been standard features of competing stores like Google Play or Apple’s iTunes, for example. Though many developers still integrate third-party SDKs to allow for increased capabilities and more detailed reporting beyond what comes out-of-the-box, it’s expected for the Appstore itself to at least provide some sort of basic insight into an app’s traction and sales. Amazon says that reports have been a “popular request from developers,” and that’s likely an understatement.

The addition of the new Engagement Reports comes on the heels of several other changes Amazon has introduced in recent months to beef up its Appstore offerings for developers. Not only has it been expanding its footprint globally, the company has also added features like in-app payments, subscriptions, and even its own virtual currency, Amazon Coins, in order to give developers more revenue generation possibilities.

Now that developers have had a little time to experiment with those new offerings, it only makes sense that they should be able to track how well those features are performing, and whether or not they have an effect on key metrics like ARPU (average revenue per user) and retention.

Additional information about the various parts of the reports and how to access them are explainedhere. Meanwhile, an Engagement Reports FAQ offers the answers to even more specific questions about the new reports.

Source: TechCrunch

Report by: SARAH PEREZ

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