Amazon buys MX Player

Manish Singh, reporting for Techcrunch:

The two firms reached a definitive agreement for the deal on Wednesday evening, a source familiar with the matter told TechCrunch. The deal values MX Player at less than $100 million, far short of the $500 million valuation at which the streamer raised its last capital, the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the companies are yet to publicly comment on the deal, told TechCrunch.

Amazon is acquiring some assets of MX Player, but not the entire firm, which also counts Tencent among its backers.

MX Player has some of the most obscure web-series content that I’ve seen, but also has some good hits like Ek thi Begum, Aani Kay Hava, Pandu, Indori Ishq, etc. From what I’ve seen, MX Player is much more popular in the semi-urban and rural towns than in the metros, so I can see why Amazon was interested in the deal.

June 6, 2024 ✚ Permalink

Cloudtail India to Cease Operations from May 2022

Chaitali Chakravarty & Writankar Mukherjee reporting for the Economic Times:

One of Amazon India’s largest sellers Cloudtail India is going to stop operations from May 2022 with the company’s joint venture partners Amazon and N.R. Narayana Murthy-owned Catamaran Ventures will not renew the seven years old partnership when it comes up for renewal next year.

Cloudtail India is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Prione Business Services. Prione is a joint venture between Catamaran and Amazon. The two partners are going to exit from the business at a time when there is stricter surveillance on the operations of the foreign e-commerce marketplaces in the country.

The two partners have mutually decided to not continue their joint venture beyond the end of its current term ending on May 19, 2022.

I really hope Appario Retail survives.

August 9, 2021 ✚ Permalink

Backblaze B2 Now Has S3 Compatible APIs

Backblaze has just announced that it’s cloud storage service B2 is getting S3 compatible APIs. This is a massive release that makes the low-cost service compatible with tons of products, services, plugins, and apps out there.

For reference, B2 pricing starts at just $0.005/GB/month compared to $0.021/GB/month offered by Amazon.

May 4, 2020 ✚ Permalink

Amazon to Acquire eero

Amazon Press Release:

Amazon […] and eero today announced that they have entered into a definitive merger agreement under which Amazon will acquire eero. eero’s home mesh WiFi systems set up in minutes and blanket every room of a customer’s home in high-performing, reliable WiFi. eero is already delighting Amazon customers with its products and services, as indicated by eero’s 4.6-star product rating on Amazon.com.

eero makes one of the best mesh networking products available in the market today, so there’s no doubt that this is a killer acquisition for Amazon. But it begs the question, “What the fuck is Apple up to”?

Eero was started by ex-Apple employees, and their product language screams the Apple design language and experience. I just cannot fathom how Apple chose to exit this market right as it was heating up, and for a company that screams that privacy is a right, not having a product that handles the home network is a real shame.

February 12, 2019 ✚ Permalink

Airtel Starts Offering Complimentary Amazon Prime Membership for its Postpaid and V-Fiber Customers

Airtel — one of the largest telecom operators in India — has started offering complimentary Amazon Prime memberships to its postpaid and broadband customers in the country. Airtel and Amazon have partnered to offer these free Prime memberships to Airtel customers who’re either subscribed to the company’s Infinity Postpaid plans or are using Airtel’s V-Fiber broadband services.

For Airtel Postpaid customers, you can claim this complimentary benefit if you’re subscribed to a Infinity postpaid plan of ₹499 or higher. For Airtel V-Fiber broadband customers, you need to be on a ₹849 or higher plan to be eligible for the complimentary one-year membership to Amazon Prime.

Unfortunately, Amazon users who already have an existing Prime memberships cannot take advantage of this offer, as the offer is valid for new users only.

To claim the offer, you need to download the Airtel TV app available for iOS and Android and click on the banner in the app. You’ll be asked to sign into your Amazon account, or you can sign up for a new Amazon too.

This offer is not currently available for Airtel’s Prepaid customers.

January 12, 2018 ✚ Permalink