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Amazon wants to enter the e-learning market. What should be the strategy?

  • Related to Product Launch
  • For Platform PM
  Amazon
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Answers (1)

Clarifications

  • Let’s clarify the E-learning market.
    • Who is the target User? [Users who wish to get continued education so that they can find better paid jobs]
    • Do we plan to offer certificates? [Yes]
  • What does Amazon hope to achieve by entering? [Primary: Establish a brand in E-learning and gain marketshare; Secondary: Address the talent shortage for Amazon]
  • Which Country will we launch first? [I would like to hear your opinion]
Analysis
  • Strength
    • Customer Connection: Most house hold in US and Developed Countries
    • Experience with Video Service: Amazon Prime
    • Cost efficiency: Since Amazon owns AWS
    • Amazon’s financial capacity to invest
    • Job opportunity: Amazon has a lot of job openings every year
  • Weakness
    • Content: Amazon lacks comprehensive course contents
    • Platform: Amazon doesn’t have an existing e-learning platform
  • Landscape
    • A lot of competition already there, coursera, edx; Many universities put courses online already.
Strategic Choices
  1. Develop platform and content in-house
  2. Strategic Partnership with a e-learning provider, such as Coursera
  3. Acquire a leading e-learning provider
Evaluation Criteria
  • Time to Market(TTM)
  • User Experience(UX)
  • Operation Complexity (Complexity)
  • Cost
  • Strategic Impact to (Impact)
Evaluation
Criteria Opt1: In-house Opt2: Partnership Opt3: Acquisition
TTM Long Short Short
UX Poor initially Good Good
Operation Complexity Low, High, need to coordinate between 2 companies Low
Cost High Low High
Strategic Impact High Low High

Recommendation?

Based on the above evaluation, I would like to recommend Amazon to acquire a leading e-learning provider in the market. The advantages are quick TTM and good UX given the company already have a mature platform, Low operation complexity because of clear ownership and strategic alignment. High strategic Impact because Amazon owns the service, the user. This option indeed requires higher upfront cost for the acquisition, but it’s not a big problem for Amazon.

To differentiate with other players in the market, Amazon can utilize its customer connection (Prime), Job Opportunities and competitive pricing.