Exclusive: Amazon quietly hiked prices on Echo, Fire TV, Kindle, and eero overnight to offset ‘significant increases’ in memory costs
The e-commerce company's hardware price hikes follow similar moves by Apple, Dell, and Microsoft Xbox.
Amazon recently increased the prices of several of its first-party devices, including the Echo smart speakers, Fire TV line, Kindle, and eero wireless mesh networking systems. This surge in costs comes as memory chip shortages put pressure on several industries. The company adjusted its hardware product line overnight, with notable price hikes for the Echo Dot, Echo Show 11, Kindle models, Fire TV Stick HD and Fire TV Stick 4K Max, and the eero 7 and eero Pro 7 systems.
Amazon did not raise prices for its Ring products. The company explained that they had to absorb these increases for as long as they could, and now they are adjusting pricing across their product lines. Amazon aims to continue offering products at accessible prices while also offering promotions throughout the year. The recent price hikes follow a similar move by Apple to raise costs for its Macs and iPads due to the high cost of memory chips.
Microsoft also announced a price increase for its Xbox game consoles. Amazon's decision to raise prices is particularly notable given its reputation for affordable hardware. The company expects to spend $220 billion on capital expenditures this year, primarily on building and equipping data centers to support AI services, up from its previous estimate of $200 billion.
Despite the higher memory costs, Amazon's CEO, Andy Jassy, stated that the company still won't have enough capacity to meet all the demand expected by 2026 and 2027.
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