Amazon has clashed with rival tech giants Apple and Google for the past few years, but it looks like some of that feuding is finally coming to an end. After a two-year absence, Amazon will finally start selling the Apple TV and Google Chromecast on its website again.
An Amazon spokesperson confirmed to CNET Thursday that Amazon was in the process of restocking Apple TVs and Chromecast units. The two devices are competitors to Amazon’s own set-top box, the Amazon Fire TV, and streaming stick, the Amazon Fire TV Stick. Amazon removed the rival products from its website in 2015, citing Prime Video as the reason for the move.
“It’s important that the streaming media players we sell interact well with Prime Video in order to avoid customer confusion,” a spokesperson told WIRED at the time.
Offering an Amazon Prime video app on these platforms would have solved that issue. And after years of waiting, Amazon finally did just that. The Amazon Prime Video app finally made its way to the Apple TV, and now Amazon is also selling Apple TV units itself. The Prime Video app also landed in the Google Play store in August.
Things aren’t quite settled with Google just yet. The company pulled YouTube from Amazon Fire and Echo devices earlier this month. A Google spokesperson explained that the company had been trying to reach an agreement with Amazon, “but Amazon doesn’t carry Google products like Chromecast and Google Home, doesn’t make Prime Video available for Google Cast users, and last month stopped selling some of Nest’s latest products.” Nevertheless, Amazon’s move today may act as a small olive branch.
For consumers, the dissolving of this Amazon feud is good news—especially with the holidays just around the corner. The company must have finally realized it stands more to gain from selling competitors’ products and having a presence on their platforms than it does from existing in a walled garden.
H/T CNET