transcript

Speaker 1:
[00:05] SpaceX is making another big acquisition, this time buying Cursor. Does that make sense long term? Motley Fool Money starts now. Welcome back to Motley Fool Money. Amazon announced this week that it's getting into the GLP One game. The company is bringing GLP One pills and Pens as they're now known to its platform. This doesn't necessarily include the prescriptions. You can just get your access to GLP Ones. You can also go through the Amazon prescriptions. But, you know, Rachel, this is interesting because Amazon keeps moving more and more into the medical field. You can get more and more of your prescriptions there. What's the goal here and who are they ultimately going after?

Speaker 2:
[00:53] Yeah, this is a really interesting bit of news. I mean, it's a major shift. I think one of the things that Amazon is looking to solve here is to fix one of the messier parts of health care, which is getting the actual medication to consumers. And Amazon's really leading into their strength as a logistics and pharmacy powerhouse. So under this new program, if you have an existing prescription for a GLP One medication, or you go and visit a doctor through one medical, either virtually or in-person, you can get a prescription for a GLP One. And Amazon is going to help facilitate that process of getting it to you as the consumer. Bringing GLP One pills and pens directly into the Amazon pharmacy ecosystem, they're really cutting out the middlemen. They're focusing on the supply chains. You can see how this could be more disruptive to your traditional pharmacy chains like CVS per se, than necessarily the telehealth companies we think of, like HIMSS and Rowe. I think the strategy here is to really leverage the trust and speed that people expect from Amazon delivery, integrating these medications with existing one medical clinics and pharmacy hubs. There's going to be thousands of cities where Amazon is now going to be offering same day delivery of GLP One. I read they have plans to expand that reach to up to 4,500 cities by the end of the year. And I think the bottom line here is Amazon's betting customers are going to choose reliability, fast shipping over maybe the niche branding of smaller telehealth startups. They have hundreds of millions of Prime members. They have a delivery network that no startup can really match. They offer lower prices. There's a level of convenience that can make some of the smaller platforms look like a hassle. So I actually think this is a good move for them. I mean, there's always the risk that Amazon, which is doing a million different things, might struggle with some of the elements of actually getting the medication to customers. But I think that overall, this is good news for Amazon. I think it's great news for its customers.

Speaker 1:
[02:50] Lou, the challenge here might be that this is supposed to be, Amazon's supposed to be this customer focused company, but don't customers love going to CVS?

Speaker 3:
[02:59] Yeah, do they? I mean, where else do you get those receipts, right? Yeah. Look, I get, GLP ones are splashy, so I see why this is a big deal. But this is what Amazon has been doing for a while. It really doesn't have anything to do with health care. As Rachel said, it's disrupting the pharmaceuticals. There are a lot of people who are running out to the pharmacy, especially for maintenance drugs like a statin or a GLP-1, where you don't need it this second because I have the flu and I need it real quick. It could be a hassle to get. There are a lot of people in parts of their life where the delivery makes sense. I think this is good for the consumer. It doesn't really threaten the rows of the hymns of the world. I think Amazon is deliberately avoiding that because quite frankly, they don't have to. Travis, we can argue this all day, but the dock-in-the-box model that hymns and these guys are trying to do, maybe it's because they're trying to disrupt health care, maybe it's because it's their only way to do it. They need to do it. It can work, but if you touch the wrong wire, you get electrocuted there. Amazon doesn't have to do that. And so they're not coming after these guys. These guys will remain fringe, but for the core medical establishment, this is just a more efficient way to get your medicines, just like amazon.com can be a more efficient way to get your, I don't know, paper towels or whatever you need each month versus going to Walmart.

Speaker 1:
[04:29] It's gonna be so interesting to see how they handle this transparency too. This is one thing as we look at, you know, the kids get prescriptions periodically and, you know, we have allergies and things like that. And you go to amazon and you can actually see what you're gonna pick. And when you walk into a CVS or a Walgreens, especially buying something like an EpiPen, which we gotta do a couple times a year, that's always my go-to story, but you have no idea if you're gonna be paying nothing or you're gonna be paying $600 for those things. So I applaud them for at least bringing that transparency and easy distribution, because if I can save myself that hour or two standing in line and arguing with the pharmacist, that's gonna be a huge win for consumers. So it'll be interesting to see where they take this.

Speaker 3:
[05:11] We've had this conversation before. Health care is definitely broken, and I am all for trying to fix it, and I think what you're talking about is definitely that. I mean, I'm skeptical about Roe or Hems as the solution, but the bittersweet thing here for me is, do you remember, it was what, just a decade ago that Amazon was teaming with Berkshire and JP Morgan, and they were going, like the super friends of healthcare, they were gonna just meet in their hall of justice and they were gonna fix healthcare. I think what they discovered is what everyone who has tried this has discovered. It's really, really hard to fix. At least Amazon is now trying to attack the part where they can lean into their strengths, but gosh, we need a better system, and I think it's, I guess, yay, we're getting little improvements in the fringes.

Speaker 1:
[05:53] Yeah, gotta cheer the small things, I guess, when it comes to healthcare. When we come back, we're gonna talk about Mark Zuckerberg potentially finding the perfect use case for artificial intelligence, tracking his employees. You're listening to Motley Fool Money. Welcome back to Motley Fool Money. Amazon announced this week that it's getting into the GLP-1 game. The company is bringing GLP-1 pills and pens, as they're now known, to its platform. This doesn't necessarily include the prescriptions. You can just get your access to GLP-1s. You can also go through the Amazon prescriptions. But, Rachel, this is interesting because Amazon keeps moving more and more into the medical field. You can get more and more of your prescriptions there.

Speaker 2:
[06:35] Who are they?

Speaker 1:
[06:36] What's the goal here? And who are they ultimately going after?

Speaker 2:
[06:40] Yeah, this is a really interesting bit of news. I mean, it's a major shift. I think one of the things that Amazon is looking to solve here is to fix one of the messier parts of healthcare, which is getting the actual medication to consumers. Amazon is really leading into their strength as a logistics and pharmacy powerhouse. So under this new program, if you have an existing prescription for a GLP-1 medication, or you go and visit a doctor through one medical, either virtually or in person, you can get a prescription for a GLP-1. And Amazon is going to help facilitate that process of getting it to you as the consumer. Bringing GLP-1 pills and pens directly into the Amazon pharmacy ecosystem, they're really cutting out the middlemen. We're focusing on the supply chains. You can see how this could be more disruptive to your traditional pharmacy chains like CVS per se than necessarily the telehealth companies we think of, like HIMSS and Roe. I think the strategy here is to really leverage the trust and speed that people expect from Amazon delivery, integrating these medications with existing one medical clinics and pharmacy hubs. There's going to be thousands of cities where Amazon is now going to be offering same day delivery of JLP-1. I read they have plans to expand that reach to up to 4,500 cities by the end of the year, and I think the bottom line here is Amazon's betting that customers are going to choose reliability, fast shipping over maybe the niche branding of smaller telehealth startups. They have hundreds of millions of prime members. They have a delivery network that no startup can really match. They offer lower prices. There's a level of convenience that can make some of the smaller platforms look like a hassle. I actually think this is a good move for them. There's always the risk that Amazon, which is doing a million different things, might struggle with some of the elements of actually getting the medication to customers. But I think that overall, this is good news for Amazon. I think it's great news for its customers.

Speaker 1:
[08:37] Lou, the challenge here might be that this is supposed to be, Amazon is supposed to be this customer focused company, but don't customers love going to CVS?

Speaker 3:
[08:46] Yeah, do they? I mean, where else do you get those receipts, right? Yeah. Look, I get, GLP-1s are splashy, so I see why this is a big deal. But this is what Amazon has been doing for a while. It really doesn't have anything to do with health care. As Rachel said, it's disrupting the pharmaceuticals. There are a lot of people who go running out to the pharmacy, especially for maintenance drugs like a statin or a GLP-1, where you don't need it this second because I have the flu and I need it real quick. It could be a hassle to get it. There are a lot of people in parts of their life where the delivery makes sense. I think this is good for the consumer. It doesn't really threaten the rows of the hymns of the world. I think Amazon is deliberately avoiding that because, quite frankly, they don't have to. Travis, we can argue this all day, but the dock-in-the-box model that hymns and rows of these guys are trying to do, maybe it's because they're trying to disrupt health care. Maybe it's because it's their only way to do it. They need to do it. It can work, but you can also get, if you touch the wrong wire, you get electrocuted there. Amazon doesn't have to do that, and so they're not coming after these guys. These guys will remain fringe, but for the core medical establishment, this is just a more efficient way to get your medicines, just like amazon.com can be a more efficient way to get your, I don't know, paper towels or whatever you need each month versus going to Walmart.

Speaker 1:
[10:15] It's gonna be so interesting to see how they handle this. Transparency too, this is one thing as we look at, the kids get prescriptions periodically and we have allergies and things like that. And you go to Amazon and you can actually see what you're gonna pay. And when you walk into a CVS or a Walgreens, especially buying something like an EpiPen, which we gotta do a couple times a year, that's always my go-to story, but you have no idea if you're gonna be paying nothing or you're gonna be paying $600 for those things. So I applaud them for at least bringing that transparency and easy distribution because if I can save myself that hour or two standing in line and arguing with the pharmacist, that's gonna be a huge win for consumers. So it'd be interesting to see where they take this.

Speaker 3:
[10:57] We've had this conversation before. Health care is definitely broken and I am all for trying to fix it. And I think what you're talking about is definitely that. I mean, I'm skeptical about Roe or Hems as the solution, but the bittersweet thing here for me is, do you remember, it was what, just a decade ago that Amazon was teaming with Berkshire and JP Morgan and they were going, like the super friends of health care, they were gonna just meet in their hall of justice and they were gonna fix health care. I think what they discovered is what everyone who has tried this has discovered. It's really, really hard to fix. At least Amazon is now trying to attack the part where they can lean into their strengths, but gosh, we need a better system. And I think it's, I guess, yay, we're getting little improvements in the fringes.

Speaker 1:
[11:40] Yeah, gotta cheer the small things, I guess, when it comes to health care. When we come back, we're gonna talk about Mark Zuckerberg potentially finding the perfect use case for artificial intelligence, tracking his employees. You're listening to Motley Fool Money. Welcome back to Motley Fool Money. Meta has found its new use case for artificial intelligence. This is a variety of different sources, but Reuter's headline, I think, was the most telling, Meta to start capturing employee mouse movements and keystrokes for AI training data. Rachel, has Mark Zuckerberg found the perfect use case for AI?

Speaker 2:
[12:17] I think that remains to be seen. So this idea of tracking every click, scrolling keystroke under the guise of productivity and future model training, maybe that's it. I mean, this means they'd be essentially turning their own workforce into this massive living ongoing data set. So then you have to think, is the use case for AI just finding more efficient ways to look over your shoulder? I don't know about that. It does raise some questions about the future of work in an AI-driven economy. If Meta succeeds in productizing the literal brain power and workflows of its engineers, for example, are they building a replacement for that workforce eventually? It's interesting. We spent years worrying about what AI will do to us, but maybe we should have been more worried about what it's going to watch us do. I think Zuck is trying to not just build the future, I think he's trying to watch us build it too. Maybe in the world of big tech, the line between cutting edge innovation and the digital overlord has never been more blurred. But I can't say I'm surprised by this news. It would be interesting to say what those data sets actually look like if we ever get to see them.

Speaker 1:
[13:21] Lou, Zuck's arc is so fascinating because he goes from villain to hero to villain. And now I think he's maybe taking another villain turn if he's tracking everybody this closely.

Speaker 3:
[13:30] I guess. Look, I'm not here to defend this, but come on, everybody's been doing this forever. It's just a new tool to do it. So I'm kind of over it. But I have two points to make, a serious one and then maybe a not so serious one. Number one, I do think that this does, this is admitting a vulnerability, okay? The reason to do this is there really isn't the high-quality interactive training data they need to actually replace their employees. There isn't a source for that other than the employees who are doing it, which is, look, maybe Zuck has figured out a way, so it's not a... There's ways around that vulnerability, but it does feel like that this is a mission of weakness. But Travis, here's the funniest thing. The AI does this. It starts training by watching people, and suddenly the AI, instead of being this productive machine, ends up spending half the day scrolling Instagram or going on Amazon to try and find a dress or something or something for the weekend. There's so many ways that this could like backfire, where if we make AI more human, be careful what you wish for.

Speaker 1:
[14:35] Yeah, you could argue that meta has been making people less productive for the last 20 years. Maybe this will make AI less productive as well.

Speaker 3:
[14:42] The future we begged for.

Speaker 1:
[14:45] As always, people on the program may have interest in the stocks they talk about and The Motley Fool may have formal recommendations for or against, so don't buy or sell stocks based solely on what you hear. All personal finance content follows The Motley Fool's editorial standards and is not approved by advertisers. Advertisements are sponsored content and provided for informational purposes only. To see our full advertising disclosure, please check out our show notes. We're Lou Whiteman, Rachel Warren, Bart Shannon behind the glass. I'm Travis Hoium. Thanks for listening to Motley Fool Money. We'll see you here tomorrow.