What I learned from rereading Jeff Bezos' Shareholder Letters (for the 3rd time!)
It's all about the long term.
Jeff Bezos, first shareholder Letter, 1997 this is day one for the Internet, and if we execute well for Amazon today, online commerce saves customers money and precious time.
Tomorrow, through personalization, online commerce will accelerate the very process of discovery.
Amazon uses the Internet to create real value for its customers and by doing so hopes to create an enduring franchise.
Even in established and large markets, we have a window of opportunity.
As larger players marshal the resources to pursue the online opportunity, and as customers new to purchasing online are receptive to forming new relationships, our goal is to move quickly, to solidify and extend our current position.
While we begin to pursue the online commerce opportunities in other areas, we see substantial opportunity in the large markets that we are targeting.
This strategy is not without risk.
It requires serious investment and crisp execution against established leaders.
We believe that a fundamental measure of our success will be the shareholder value we create over the long term.
The stronger our market leadership, the more powerful our economic model.
Market leadership can translate directly to higher revenue, higher profitability, greater capital velocity, and correspondingly stronger returns on invested capital.
We have invested and will continue to invest aggressively to expand and leverage our customer base, brand and infrastructure as we move to establish an enduring franchise.
There's that word again where right in the beginning he's already said that we use the word enduring twice.
Because of our emphasis on the long term, we may make decisions and weigh trade offs differently than some companies.
We want to share with you our fundamental management and decision making approach so that you, our shareholders, may confirm that is consistent with your investment philosophy, we will continue to focus relentlessly on our customers.
We will make bold rather than timid investment decisions where we see a sufficient probability of gaining market leadership advantages.
Some of these investments will pay off, others will not.
And we will have learned another valuable lesson in either case.
When forced to choose between optimizing the appearance of our GAAP accounting and maximizing the present value of future cash flows, we'll take the cash flows.