Investigation of Digital Platform and Ecosystems Amazon

Ecosystems are dynamic in nature, but they are regulated by one or more of the leading firms - keystone organizations. Keystone organizations play a structuring role in the ecosystem in terms of value creation and use. This is indeed the case of Amazon in its ecosystem. The goal of the work is to describe the formation of Amazon in an emerging ecosystem, existence as a keystone player in the e-commerce ecosystem, as well as gain an in-depth understanding of the Amazon case and determine which key positional and cooperative strategies have led to significant growth of the company using a qualitative single case study method. The main tasks of the work are the study of the formation of the emerging ecosystem, the analysis of coopetitive strategies, as well as the application of Amazon strategies on the example of a nascent ecosystem. The results show that Amazon, using coopetitive strategies as part of its business model, has been become a keystone player in the e-commerce ecosystem, expanding every day. Specifically, it was determined that Amazon has become a keystone player in the e-commerce ecosystem during its inception stage, which led to tremendous market growth, efficiency of using and obtaining resources. Based on the results obtained, it can be assumed that at the stages of the emergence and formation of an ecosystem, it may be beneficial for a firm to increase the market size of its competitors or create markets for them. Although Amazon is not yet a monopoly, since it is not the dominant player in the ecosystem, Amazon has revolutionized the market by cutting prices. Several recommendations were also developed for company managers, who relying on it will be able to make decisions under conditions of uncertainty at all stages of the nascent ecosystem. All tasks were completed. Thus, the results can contribute to the research of ecosystem development: positioning, decision-making process under conditions of uncertainty, will help managers understand the possible benefits of positional and cooperative strategies, as well as in research on Amazon as a new type of monopoly.