Amazon Lands Another Unexpected (and Shrewd) Acquisition

E-commerce and cloud computing giant Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) is no stranger to game-changing acquisitions.

This week, the company signed a merger agreement for Roomba maker iRobot (NASDAQ: IRBT). The all-cash deal will cost Amazon $1.7 billion and add a brand-new wrinkle to Amazon's range of household-helper technology products. However, recent Roomba systems already work with Amazon's Alexa platform, so integrating iRobot's assets and technologies should be pretty painless.

In fact, buyouts are such an important part of Amazon's business model that it's easy to forget just how game-changing these deals can be. Let me remind you of a few highlights from Amazon's long, rich acquisition history. I'm sure you'll recognize many names along the way -- and maybe you forgot that some of them actually weren't Amazon brands from the start.

Continue reading

Source Fool.com