How Walmart caught up with Amazon

Two decades ago, Walmart was on top of the world. The business model of cheap prices and giant big-box stores, pioneered by founder Sam Walton, had delivered a market share that no other American retail chain could touch. Then e-commerce arrived in the shape of a formidable new competitor—Amazon. Yet despite being written off at the time by pundits and investors as a retail dinosaur, Walmart has quietly reinvented itself as a tech company. Now it’s fast closing the gap on Amazon, and its huge presence in the physical world may even give it the edge on its online rival.

Hosts: Mike Bird and Ethan Wu. Guests: Avantika Chilkoti, The Economist’s global business writer; Dan Bartlett, Walmart’s Executive Vice President for Corporate Affairs; Suresh Kumar, Walmart’s Chief Technology Officer; and Simeon Gutman, retail analyst at Morgan Stanley.