Amazon to cut 14,000 corporate jobs

Amazon said Tuesday it plans to cut 14,000 jobs in its corporate workforce as it seeks to reduce bureaucracy, remove layers and invest more in its AI strategy.

It marks the e-commerce giant’s second-biggest job cut since its downsizing 22,000 jobs in 2022. Amazon was About 1.2 million employees As of October 31, 2024, more than 360,000 of these were in the corporate sector, in administrative, sales and executive roles.

A Memo Sharing with employees, Amazon’s senior vice president of people experience and technology, Beth Galetti, wrote that the move is aimed at making the company “more robust” with resources to invest in its “biggest bets.”

Galetti acknowledged that the decision would be questionable in light of the company’s good performance, but argued that the layoffs were necessary because “the world is changing fast.”

“This generation of AI is the most transformative technology we’ve seen since the Internet, and it’s enabling companies to innovate much faster than ever before (in existing market segments and entirely new ones). We’ve been convicted. [sic] That we need to be more strongly organized [sic]With fewer layers and more ownership, moving as quickly as possible for our customers and business,” he wrote.

The layoffs come at a time when Amazon is investing heavily in technology infrastructure to build more computing power to offer AI services.

In June, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy wrote in a memo to staff The company will need fewer employees as it rolls out more AI agents “As we develop more generative AI and agents, it should change the way we work. Jobs that are currently being done will require fewer people and more people to do other types of work. It’s hard to know where exactly this will go over time, but in the next few years, we expect it to reduce our total corporate workforce by using AI widely across the company.”

That focus is clearly visible if you consider the company’s spending on technology infrastructure. Amazon said it spent $55.6 billion in the first half of its current fiscal year primarily on technology infrastructure to support the growth of its cloud services business, Amazon Web Services. Quarterly report.

The company’s revenue rose 13% to $167.7 billion in the second quarter from a year earlier. AWS has been calculated for 18% of total net sales.

Reuters reported on Monday that the company plans to Cutting up to 30,000 jobs Across human resources, devices and services, operations and other departments.

The company also cut small jobs across various divisions. In January, Amazon cut a small number of its positions Communication and sustainability department

Amazon said it is offering the most affected employees 90 days to seek a new role internally, and that its recruiters will prioritize internal candidates for new roles within the company. It will offer severance pay, outplacement services, health insurance benefits and more for those who cannot move internally.

Galetti wrote that in 2026, the company will continue to eliminate layers and “realize efficiency gains” while hiring in key areas.