Key facts
- Amazon's World Product Graph would compile product data by having brands contribute and by crawling other retailers' websites, per the document.
- The document says many Rufus answers are factually wrong or incomplete, and Amazon said its data shows Alexa for Shopping is roughly 97% accurate globally.
- Amazon said draft, outdated documents often paint an incomplete picture and the brainstorming document does not necessarily reflect current plans.
- Meta's Muse agent gained more than 10 million users in the US and Canada since launching in September, and Amazon blocked it from its site that month.
- CEO Andy Jassy said Alexa for Shopping has been used by over 400 million people in the past year.
Amazon has drafted an internal plan, called World Product Graph, to compile product data on virtually every item for sale on Earth, whether Amazon stocks it or not, according to an internal document reviewed by Reuters and people familiar with the matter. The document, written like a press release, carries an aspirational future release date of October 1, 2027. Reuters could not determine if or when the plan may be implemented.
The initiative would have brands and retailers contribute product data continuously to Amazon, while Amazon also independently crawls other retailers' websites, according to the document. Reuters could not determine how Amazon planned to crawl the sites or whether it would need to seek permission in all cases. Amazon has already signed up Coca-Cola and Bayer, among others, to contribute data, and held a CEO-level P&G/Amazon summit for a trial with Procter & Gamble, the document says. The companies did not respond to requests for comment.
The project is part of Amazon's Selection & Catalog Systems unit and is being organized under Robert Tekiela, a vice president in the division, according to the document. Tekiela did not respond to a request for comment. Amazon is shuffling staff internally to get the project off the ground, according to one of the people, though Reuters could not determine if the October 1 date is a realistic deadline.
The document also addresses problems with Amazon's AI-powered search engine Rufus, which the company began calling Alexa for Shopping in May. "Many Rufus answers are factually wrong or incomplete, but customers lack expertise to detect these errors," the document says. Users conduct about 83 million searches weekly using Rufus, and running them is expensive, according to the document. In its statement to Reuters, Amazon said the usage figures are significantly outdated and that its data shows Alexa for Shopping is roughly 97% accurate globally.
World Product Graph would also help fend off AI shopping agents that may send customer traffic to other sites, the people said. Meta's Muse agent has garnered more than 10 million users in the US and Canada since launching in September, and Amazon blocked Muse from its retail site that month. Amazon sued AI firm Perplexity in 2025 to prevent similar access, a case that is still ongoing. CEO Andy Jassy said on the company's third-quarter earnings call that few customers are doing much shopping this way yet and that Amazon's advertising business has been minimally impacted. Jassy also said Alexa for Shopping has been used by over 400 million people in the past year.
In a statement, Amazon said: "Draft, outdated documents often paint an incomplete picture and the existence of a brainstorming document such as this one doesn't necessarily reflect our current plans." The document is what Amazon calls a PR/FAQ, a narrative memo laying out the rationale for a new product, and not all such memos lead to a service being introduced. The people said World Product Graph could be modified or aborted due to financial or other concerns.