Photo: Walmart
SC Digest Editorial Staff
Through a special arrangement, presented here for discussion is a summary of a current article from Supply Chain Digest.
Satish Jindel, president of SJ Consulting Group and ShipMatrix, caused quite a stir in late June when he told attendees at the SMC3 conference in Palm Beach that Walmart is sending veiled messages to trucking companies that carry its freight that if they do business with Amazon too, it may not want to work with them anymore.
"Walmart would prefer to do business with carriers that are not doing business with Amazon," in part due to concerns about their ability to handle high volumes of deliveries during peak times, Mr. Jindel afterwards told the New York Post.
Jindel added that Walmart began having these conversations with carriers over the past 30 days or so, and that he has talked directly with some of those carriers.
"These developments, if true, are likely to have significant implications for US transportation companies as Amazon and Walmart remain two of the largest users of truckload capacity," wrote Deusche Bank industry analyst Amit Mehrotra in a research note based on the news.
However, a Walmart spokesman denied that the company has had discussions with trucking companies about high-peak delivery times or about Amazon, adding that "it would be illegal for us to tell them who they can do business with."
Walmart also sent an e-mail to Heavy Duty Trucking magazine that "This report is false."
The news came a week after The Wall Street Journal reported that Walmart was also telling its technology vendors that they cannot run any of their software on Amazon's AWS Cloud platform.
Part of that demand may be related to just not wanting to even indirectly generate revenues for Amazon, but Walmart spokesman Dan Toporek added, "It shouldn't be a big surprise that there are cases in which we'd prefer our most sensitive data isn't sitting on a competitor's platform."
The Journal also reported that other large retailers also have requested that service providers move away from AWS, according to technology vendors that work with retailers.
- Walmart Denies Telling Carriers It Doesn't Want Them Hauling Freight for Amazon – Supply Chain Digest
- Walmart escalates war of words with Amazon – New York Post
- Wal-Mart to Vendors: Get Off Amazon’s Cloud – The Wall Street Journal
- Consultant: Walmart Doesn't Want Its Carriers Hauling for Amazon – Heavy Duty Trucking