$amzn what if spending eased

In 2010 Amazon's revenue growth seemingly shifts higher. 

Income from Operations grew in a consistent fashion until the end of 2010. In 2011, Amazon embarked on a spending journey, directly attributed to additional fulfillment centers and 'technology'.

But an interesting development took place toward the end of 2011. Gross Margins started to rise.

Quarter-on-quarter there have been a distinct improvement.

The reason is probably due to a multi faceted approch of third party resellers, AWS ('other' revenues) and Prime memberships. 

The one that is the most interesting revenue stream is Prime memberships. A recent analysis suggested that 50 million Amazon costumers are Prime members. If that is true, that's an additional $4-5B a year high margin revenue.

What if Amazon ignored the future prospects of a Hardware-as-part of the platform or did not care about the logistics side of its business. (Let's ignore the fact that revenue growth may not be where it is today from the spending. What if spending eased?

(The blue line assumes a continuation of income trajectory. The green line assumes income growth in relation to revenue growth. The grey line attempts incorporate the increased Gross Margins.)