NEWS FLASH: This Spring, Amazon is reportedly launching its NFT initiative.
Amazon might soon join the list of Fortune 500 companies to enter the NFT market. The world’s largest online retailer intends to introduce a “digital assets enterprise” — an NFT program, in other words — this spring, according to a report published today by Blockworks. The startup would concentrate on blockchain-based gaming that pays gamers with NFTs, according to one unnamed individual the newspaper spoke with.

The platform will purportedly be managed by Amazon itself rather than Amazon Web Services (AWS), but it is still unclear who is in charge of hiring the key staff.
This information follows the recent agreement between AWS and Ava Labs, the organization responsible for the Avalanche blockchain. The teams stated in a news statement at the time that Ava Labs intended to bring Subnet deployment as a managed service to the AWS Marketplace, allowing users to quickly establish customized Subnets. The ability to instantly spin up nodes and test networks with AWS in whichever legal jurisdiction makes the most sense for them has been a significant advantage for both individual and enterprise developers, according to Emin Gün Sirer, founder and CEO of Ava Labs.

To that sense, the most recent NFT news is just Amazon’s most recent move into the Web3 space—a move that many anticipated.

Andy Jassy, the CEO of Amazon, expressed his belief that the company would offer NFTs in a Squawkbox interview on CNBC in April 2022. “I anticipate that NFTs will keep expanding extremely quickly. We’re probably not close to integrating cryptocurrency as a payment method in our retail operation, but I do think it will grow over time, he predicted at the time. Jessy responded, “Yeah, I think it’s down the line,” when asked if he could imagine Amazon selling NFTs.
This recent strategy appears to be an outgrowth of earlier rumors of Amazon working with well-known Web3-native artists. Amazon had already entered the NFT market through a television series called NFTMe, which examines NFT culture and disruption throughout the globe.

Aside from what unnamed sources told Blockworks, little is known about Amazon’s upcoming foray into NFTs; however, the company is likely to reveal more details to the public in the coming months since April appears to be the tentative release date for these current endeavors, according to the report.