Amazon is reportedly looking to lay off approximately 10,000 employees this month, the first and largest such move in the company’s history.
According to a New York Times report Monday (Nov. 14), which cited unnamed sources familiar with the staffing reduction, the cuts would be focused on Amazon’s devices division — which includes the company’s voice-assistant Alexa — as well as its retail and human resources departments.
The company currently has over 1.5 million global employees, meaning a layoff of this scale would represent about a 0.5% headcount reduction.
Amazon has not responded to PYMNTS’ emailed request for comment on the reported cutback, but has made no revision to its previously announced plans to hire as many as 150,000 people for seasonal help during the holidays.
By potentially making these cuts around the holiday season, Amazon’s move shines a light on how the rocky global economy is pressuring tech businesses that had previously been focused exclusively on growth and hiring versus cost cutting.
In the company’s Q3 earnings call, CFO Brian Olsavsky said: “As we’ve done at similar times in our history, we’re also taking actions to tighten our belt, including pausing hiring in certain businesses and winding down products and services where we believe our resources are better spent elsewhere.”
Earlier this month, however, the company also said that it would be freezing corporate hires.
At that time, Amazon’s senior vice president of people experience and technology Beth Galetti said in a memo to employees: “We still intend to hire a meaningful number of people in 2023.”
If true, the layoffs at the eCommerce giant would follow in the wake of other Big Tech company’s currently shrinking their headcount, including Meta’s layoffs announced last week (Nov. 9) of over 11,000 employees, or 13% of its workforce.
Twitter has also made major staff cuts, announcing last week (Nov. 8) that it was reducing its staff by 3,700 people as a result of Elon Musk taking over the company this month.