I guess I phrased that poorly.
What I was trying to convey was that by horizontally scaling (like a comment in this thread said), Amazon, like Apple can create this ecosystem in which they provide consumers an incentive to be a part of and stay within it. Essentially, they're making Prime look better (which is not a problem), but once they have these customers using these Prime services, it'll be hard for them to change (similar to how people who own MacBooks lean a little bit toward buying an iPhone for the ecosystem integration), essentially "locking" them within the Prime ecosystem, giving them control over pricing and other parameters. At first glance, buying Boost doesn't sound like a bad option, but by horizontally scaling their ecosystem, they get better control over pricing since they make a nice ecosystem of products for their customers to use.
> “If a company is dominant, that’s fine,” Ms. Vestager told reporters. “But if that dominance is abused, then we have an issue.”
Having a monopoly and not abusing it is impossible when you're dealing with humans. Maybe in a hundred years where business decisions run through a DLNN and are cross-referenced with the law to make sure they're in compliance, a monopoly that doesn't abuse its dominance will become a reality.
As I inferred with sarcasm, this divergence from vertical to horizontal growth could effectively lead to oligopolies in the major markets(the few where they don't exist).
I believe in the competitive market model up until economies of scale and purpose driven occupation out weigh it's benefits. e.g. manufacturing jet engines requires huge amounts of equity and legacy knowledge for safety. e.g. automating warehousing may lead to more fulfilling or mentally stimulating occupations.
Amazon as a force in the larger economy versus a subset of markets in the economy could spur innovation in stagnant markets. On the other side of the coin, leveraging their massive infrastructure gives them an unfair advantage as they enter new sectors which can lead to an increased market barrier and prevent firms with new ideas from competing.
As they stand, they aren't that much bigger than normal conglomerates[1]. But, they have strategically placed themselves in critical service areas like cloud computing. I think if they can force markets to evolve then we should allow them to grow with a discerning eye.
