Amazon to stop selling Apple TV and Google Chromecast Oct. 29 as devices don't allow for Amazon Prime video streaming; Roku, Xbox, PlayStation sales continue
Amazon Will Ban Sale of Apple, Google Video-Streaming Devices — Amazon.com Inc. is flexing its e-commerce muscles to gain …
Context & Ripple Effects
Amazon is turning its own storefront into a negotiating lever for Prime Video: devices it sells must carry its service, so Apple TV, Google's Chromecast and the Nexus Player are being pulled from sale on Oct. 29, while Roku, Xbox and PlayStation stay shelved. The Verge's follow-up catalogs the multiple motivations behind the move, which sits alongside an earlier 2015 decision to ban the Kodi/XBMC app — both instances of Amazon curating what its store and devices may carry.
The escalation was swift and total: within a month Amazon removed every Apple TV and Chromecast listing, including third-party resellers', before quietly reversing course and restocking both devices two years later.
First-order effects
- Apple and Google lose access to the largest US e-commerce channel for their streaming hardware heading into the holiday quarter, with no Prime Video app to show for their absence.
- Roku, Microsoft and Sony become the only mainstream streaming-device lines still sold on Amazon, giving them a de facto merchandising advantage during peak season.
Second-order effects
- Apple TV and Chromecast buyers are pushed to rival retailers, shifting sales volume toward physical stores and competitors' channels while raising Apple's and Google's cost of distribution.
- The move pressures Apple and Google to strike Prime Video availability deals — the exact concession Amazon demanded — since exclusion from Amazon's shelf is now demonstrably enforceable.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, marketplace owners increasingly price access by service alignment, forcing consumer-electronics makers to treat retail placement as a licensing negotiation rather than a given.
- The 2017 restock shows the tactic has limits: withholding distribution cuts both ways when the excluded party's ecosystem matters to your customers, tempering how far platform gatekeeping can go.
The trend: Streaming is entering a distribution-war phase in which retail and platform gatekeepers trade shelf space for service access, with Prime Video versus competing ecosystems as the opening front.