The final paragraph of this piece sums up the challenge Walmart is facing with this change:<p>“If you look at Walmart, over its 50 year existence, they’ve always prided themselves on saying our employees are going to be the lowest paid,” says Schlademan. “Now they’ve changed their business model.”<p>While Walmart’s stock hasn’t returned to its pre-2015 heyday, things are looking up for the world’s largest retailer. If I were in the Digital leadership team, I would push for a partnership with Google Home to compete with the Alexa-enabled retail channel that Amazon has established, sans much fanfare (my opinion). As of last week, Google announced a partnership with Target, but Walmart (and Jet.com) have the more optimized supply chain and better prices. Maybe Google could negotiate a better deal with Target, which would be why they went with them vs. Walmart.<p>Amazon is practically giving Alexa devices away in a manner reminiscent of how Gillette gave their razors away. Alexa plus Amazon getting into every retail segment plus Amazon branded items plus FBA plus Prime plus ... is a multi-prong approach that will require a number of companies to band together to counter. From my vantage point, no one company can compete against this Goliath / Ser Gregor alone.