The American e-commerce giant announced on Tuesday, March 8 that none of its products will be delivered in the country of Vladimir Putin.
Jeff Bezos’ company is the latest major American technology company to take sanctions against Russia and Belarus. While not necessarily a major player in the country, Amazon decided to suspend deliveries and block registrations to its cloud service, Amazon Web Services.
No more delivery or cloud in Russia
Over the past few days, there has been one disengagement after another from many US technology companies. Most Silicon Valley companies have cut their ties with Russia. Oracle, Intel, Apple, Google, Airbnb, Microsoft and AMD have decided to suspend their activities on Russian territory. Measures taken in line with the sanctions imposed by the U.S. government.
It is now Amazon’s turn to comply with government directives. The e-commerce giant announced on Tuesday March 8 that none of its products will be delivered in Vladimir Putin’s country.
A decision taken in response to the invasion of Ukraine, which forced the group to “take additional measures in the region”. In its press release, the company of Jeff Bezos explains that it has “suspended the shipment of retail products to customers based in Russia and Belarus. The Seattle firm even decided to go further by suspending the accounts of its streaming service Amazon Prime, to all Russian subscribers. Amazon adds that “we are no longer taking orders for New World, which is the only game we sell directly in Russia.
Amazon has never really tried to develop the Russian market
It is important to note that Amazon’s business is much smaller in Russia than in the European Union. It does not have a logistic site in Putin’s country, as it is the case everywhere in Europe, nor a website, but the company still delivered to Russian customers who placed orders from other websites. In Russia, there are other major retail players. Local competitors like Wildberries or Ozon. Indeed, the high import taxes make Amazon’s products uncompetitive in Russia.
Same thing for Amazon Web Services, the company’s cloud service. The American firm specifies that “we have no data center, no infrastructure or office in Russia. Our policy has long been not to work with the Russian government. Most AWS customers in the country are in fact local subsidiaries of international groups.
This decision to stop all the group’s activities also follows a request from the Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister, Mykhailo Fedorov, who asked Amazon to suspend access to AWS services in Russia, to “support a global movement of governments and large companies opposed to the invasion of Ukraine.
