Business Insider and WSJ report that Amazon is (re-starting) an independent multichannel shipping service that competes with both FedEx and UPS.

Some details:

• Within the US, will not include US outbound.

• Sellers who ship from their own warehouse can choose Amazon as a carrier.

• Amazon had previously started this service in 2018 as a beta, and then during the lockdown, but given the surge in pandemic volume, this experiment was put on pause.

• This marks 6 countries now where Amazon has an independent shipping service -- including France, Spain, India, UK, Italy and now the United States.

Anytime Amazon does something in the market, it pays to take note of it. The competitive dynamics are tough in the market now. There is more supply than demand, there are more facilities than demand, and services than demand.

To me, this speaks to a market consolidation that could happen where bigger players gain share. Remember, Amazon doesn't operate a truly independent shipping service. It's a retail marketplace with guaranteed volume that operates a shipping service, of which it is able to offer infrastructure to others at marginal cost.

This still sounds like a long-term winning formula to me.

The elephant in the room with Amazon from a transportation point of view is always trust, however, want to know what the antidote to trust is?

Rates, Service Levels, and Patience.

Three things that many companies don't have, Amazon generally has in abundance. Don't trust Amazon today? They are usually content to "keep doing what they are doing" and wait it out.

In truth, I expect more from Amazon in supply chain services. A lot more. I expect Amazon to sell every level of its transportation network - end to end, middle mile, and last-mile. That's just what you do with fixed assets, and it's been Amazon's playbook for 20 years now since they opened their marketplace.

The trust question is a trickier one, but I do believe there is a long-term solution here too.