Original title: the fate of technology startups: can't get around Tencent, Ali can't beat Amazon.

In China, the two mountains that many technology start-ups cannot avoid are Tencent and Alibaba, which basically have only two choices: to be integrated or to die.

Even technology companies that can go public have paid a high price in their dealings with Tencent and Alibaba. Although they have obtained funds, traffic and customer resources from Tencent or Alibaba, the price of such support is the transfer of excessive voting rights and constraints in terms of personnel, mergers and acquisitions.

In the past two years, nearly 24 companies have listed Tencent or Alibaba as risk factors for IPO, including large companies such as Meituan Dianping and pinduoduo. "if we fail to maintain our relationship with Tencent, our business may be significantly adversely affected," pinduoduo said in the IPO document. "

As for shanzhai, Tencent is even more successful. Tencent's "reference" model is to take advantage of its large number of users and strong product management ability to launch products that are very similar or even experience better after discovering good ideas, so as to win the favor of users and kill the original. Tencent's ingenuity is that, in a legal sense, its copycat is not illegal. Of course, from copycat, improvement to innovation, Tencent has already got rid of the label of shanzhai.

This is the case in the domestic science and technology industry, and it is obvious that the foreign science and technology industry is not a good time. An article in foreign media revealed how Amazon "bullied the market".

The following is a summary of the article:

Elastic, an Amsterdam software start-up, is rapidly expanding its business and employing 100 people. It was targeted by Amazon.

In October 2015, Amazon AWS announced that it would package Elastic's free data search and analysis tool as a paid service. To make matters worse, Amazon even named its service Elasticsearch.

By integrating with other products, Amazon earned more revenue from Elasticsearch than Elastic within a year. Elastic added advanced features to its products last year, limiting the use of its tools by companies like Amazon. Amazon replicates many of these features and provides them to customers for free.

In September, Elastic sued Amazon in California federal court for infringing its trademark because Amazon used exactly the same name as its product: Elasticsearch. Elastic accused Amazon of "misleading consumers". Amazon denies wrongdoing. The case is still under trial.

Since the mid-1990s, when Microsoft used Windows to dominate the PC industry, no technology giant has feared its competitors like Amazon. The dispute with Elastic shows how it wields a big stick in the tech world.

While cloud computing may no longer stand out from the crowd, it is the foundation of a large part of the internet and has become one of the largest and most profitable businesses in the technology industry, providing computing power and software to companies. Amazon is the largest cloud service provider.

Amazon AWS Service

Amazon uses AWS to copy and integrate software pioneered by other technology companies. It gives its products a competitive advantage by improving ease of use, "hiding" competitors' products, and even reducing product prices by bundling discounts. These measures prompt customers to choose Amazon products, while the companies that actually develop these software may have no revenue.

Even so, smaller competitors say they have no choice but to work with Amazon. Because Amazon has so many customers, startups often have to tie their hands in promoting products and "voluntarily" share customer and product information with Amazon. To gain the right to sell products through AWS, startups have to share revenue with Amazon.

Copycat open source software is controversial.

Some companies have "coined" a term to describe what Amazon is doing: "ransacking" software. By digging into other companies' innovation, trying to poach their engineers, and capitalizing on their innovation profits, Amazon strangled potential competitors in the cradle, forcing them to readjust their business strategy.

Amazon's actions have drawn attention from regulators to whether it has abused its market dominance and suppressed competition. Several competitors are discussing whether to file antitrust lawsuits against Amazon, and regulators and members of Congress are investigating whether Amazon is suspected of bullying the market.

AWS is just one of Amazon's dominant weapons in many industries.

AWS is just a weapon that Amazon dominates many industries in the United States. It has changed the retail, logistics, book publishing and film and television industries, and is considering moving into prescription drug sales, real estate sales and security.

Amazon's actions related to AWS have caused more controversy. In cloud computing, it is the undisputed market leader-three times as much as its nearest rival, Microsoft. Millions of consumers unwittingly use AWS:Netflix and Apple iCloud every day using Amazon's cloud computing services.

Amazon originally developed AWS for internal use, but soon realized that other companies had the same needs. Companies such as Airbnb and General Electric basically use Amazon's cloud services rather than buying and managing their own computing systems.

For Amazon itself, AWS is also crucial. AWS had $25 billion in revenue last year-on a par with Starbucks and Amazon's most profitable business. Profits from AWS allow Amazon to continue to invest in many other industries.

Amazon said in a statement that the idea that it "ransacked" software was "stupid and unfounded", that it contributed a lot to the software industry, and that what it did was in the best interests of its customers.

Some technology companies say they have gained more customers through AWS; even companies that have disputes with Amazon, such as Elastic, which went public last year and now employs 1600, are growing.

But in interviews with more than 40 Amazon and its rival employees, both current and former, many respondents said the cost of Amazon's AWS-related actions was invisible: it was hard to measure how much business was taken away by Amazon and how many potential investors were scared away by threats from Amazon.

In February, seven software companies, CEO, met in Silicon Valley to discuss filing an antitrust lawsuit against Amazon, according to four people familiar with the matter. A lawsuit brought by manufacturers using Amazon Mall reflects their dissatisfaction: once it becomes a direct competitor, Amazon is no longer neutral. The seven CEO didn't sue Amazon for fear of getting caught up in a marathon lawsuit.

Regulators are currently approaching some of Amazon's software competitors. The House Judiciary Committee sent a letter to Amazon in September asking for information related to AWS's business; it is understood that the Federal Trade Commission is asking AWS competitors to provide information.

Salil Deshpande, founder of Uncorrelated, the venture capital firm, says what Amazon does to software start-ups can damage the industry's ecology. "it affects start-ups to generate revenue, seize control of their software and take away their customers".

Ransack

MariaDB CEO Howard: AWS's success is based on "looting open source technology"

When it first launched AWS, Amazon could not continue to make money, and the service seemed to be out of business.

But AWS is popular with startups, which can save a lot of money because they don't need to buy computing equipment up front and just pay for the computing power they use. Soon, more companies will be using Amazon cloud computing services and software.

In 2009, Amazon developed a template to accelerate the growth of AWS. That year, it launched a database management service, using open source software. For a long time, Amazon's model has not caused much controversy.

Amazon's strategy sparked controversy until 2015, when it copied Elasticsearch and launched competing products. "A company does business on open source products, and suddenly there is a company that uses its technology to compete with it," says Todd Persen Persson, a former founder of open source software InfluxDB.

Under the license agreement, Amazon does not have to pay for the use of open source technologies, but using these technologies to compete with developers will undoubtedly affect the motivation for innovation. It would also leave startups with no choice but to charge for the original open source technology or modify license agreements to restrict the way companies, including Amazon, use their technology.

Last year, MongoDB announced that it would require any company that packaged its technology as a Web service to share the underlying technology for free, a move widely seen as aimed at AWS. AWS quickly introduced its own technology-look and style similar to MongoDB technology, bypassing the requirements of MongoDB. MongoDB is one of seven companies that have considered filing an antitrust lawsuit against Amazon.

"AWS's success is based on the ransacking of open source technology," said Michael Howard, MariaDB CEO, an open source software company. He estimates that Amazon's revenue from MariaDB software is five times that of his company.

Andi Gutmans, vice president of AWS, said that some companies want to be the "only" companies that make money from open source projects, and Amazon "is committed to ensuring that open source projects remain truly open source and that customers are free to choose how to use open source software-whether they choose AWS or not".

When AWS held its first developer conference in 2012, Amazon was no longer the only giant in cloud computing: both Microsoft and Google launched cloud services.

As a result, Amazon has launched more software services, making AWS an indispensable service. Speaking at a meeting, Andy Jassy, head of AWS, said it wanted to "support every conceivable usage scenario".

Amazon has begun to add AWS services at an alarming rate-from 30 in 2014 to about 175 in December this year. It also has a "home court" advantage: simplicity and convenience.

Customers can add new AWS services with one click of the mouse and use the same system to manage them. Fees for new services will be added to the same bill and do not need to be re-reviewed by the finance or compliance department.

By contrast, using non-Amazon services on AWS is more complicated. AWS works closely with many companies to integrate their products "as seamlessly as possible", says Mr Gutmans.

Interfere with partner promotional materials

Amazon AWS developer Conference

At present, Amazon AWS developer Conference is one of the largest technology events in the world, attracting tens of thousands of people every year.

What attracted the most attention at this meeting was Yasi's speech, in which he will announce the new service of AWS. Because new AWS services tend to get some startups into trouble, his speech was nicknamed "The Red Wedding", a bloodshed in Game of Thrones.

Amazon also has "rules" for its developer conference. Companies that buy booths for tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars say their slogans, brochures and press releases must be approved in advance by Amazon.

A document from AWS sets out the corporate marketing guidelines it works with, and Amazon forbids certain words or phrases in marketing materials, such as "cloudy", to use the concept of two or more cloud platforms. An Amazon spokesman said AWS has halted the measure.

Partners are also asked to avoid using words such as "best", "first", "unique" and "leader" in marketing materials-unless supported by independent research.

Love and hate are intertwined

Nexla CEO Zorob: have reservations about Amazon

Israel's Redis Lab was founded in 2011 and operates around a free software called Redis. Amazon soon offered a similar paid service.

Former Redis lab employees estimate that Amazon generates as much as $1 billion a year from Redis technology-10 times more than Redis Labs. Amazon is also trying to poach its employees and depress its business with discounts, they say.

Some Redis Lab executives considered filing an antitrust lawsuit against Amazon this year, but others hesitated because Redis Labs generated 80 per cent of its revenue from AWS customers.

"it's a love-hate relationship," says Leena Joshi, a former vice president of marketing at Redis Labs. On the one hand, most of our customers use AWS, so it is in our interest to integrate closely with it. At the same time, we know it's eating into our business. "

Redis Labs did not comment on its revenue or what AWS did. It said Amazon provided "important services."