When Amazon Nearly Flamed Out, Jeff Bezos Conceived Kindle and Prime

From crisis came invention, Bloomberg Technology reports in the podcast Foundering: The Amazon Story.

Jeff Bezos speaks during a press conference in Tokyo in 2001. 

Photographer: Toru Yamanaka/AFP/Getty Images
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Today Amazon.com Inc. is an inescapable juggernaut. Back in 1994, it was just an idea, pitched by a former Wall Street banker named Jeff Bezos to disbelieving investors at the very birth of the internet era.