Report: Amazon Picks Ex-Microsoft Product Chief to Run Devices

Amazon is reportedly set to hire Microsoft’s product chief to oversee its devices business.

Panos Panay, who announced he was leaving Microsoft Monday (Sept. 18), will now become head of the division that makes products like Amazon’s voice assistant Alexa, Bloomberg News reported, citing sources familiar with the matter.

The news follows last month’s announcement by Amazon that David Limp, the company’s senior vice president of devices and services, was stepping down. Panay, who had been with the company since 2004, helped launch Microsoft’s Surface devices and Windows 11.

“After 19 incredible years at Microsoft, I’ve decided to turn the page and write the next chapter,” he wrote on Twitter Monday.

PYMNTS has contacted Amazon for comment but has not yet received a reply.

The Bloomberg report notes that Amazon and Microsoft will hold events this week showcasing new hardware. Amazon will hold its annual event at its campus in Virginia Wednesday (Sept. 20), while Microsoft is set to unveil new hardware models and artificial intelligence (AI) features at an event in New York Thursday (Sept. 21).

Last month saw reports that Microsoft was shutting down its digital assistant app, Cortana, for Windows 11 with an update that disables it.

As that report said, Microsoft had tried to integrate Cortana into everyday activities, but struggled to compete with Alexa or Google Assistant. The company is expected to launch Windows Copilot, a new sidebar for Windows 11 powered by Bing Chat that can perform tasks like controlling Windows settings and answering questions.

Meanwhile, Amazon’s devices division has been one of the departments at the tech giant impacted by recent job cuts, which saw roughly 27,000 positions eliminated. A report last month by The Wall Street Journal said Alexa and other gadgets had struggled to produce revenue, despite their popularity.

In announcing his retirement in August, Limp appeared to downplay that idea, telling them he was not leaving “because I am less bullish about the devices and services business. I am amazed at the momentum of all our businesses. Engagement is at an all-time high, customer satisfaction is also at some of our highest levels ever.”

As reported here earlier this year, voice assistants such as Alexa and Apple’s Siri have become familiar to consumers, although the discussion around them has shifted somewhat with the rise of AI large language models (LLMs).

“The simple fact,” PYMNTS wrote in June, “is that people like voice, and if anything, they believe it’s high time for the LLM upgrade as they would like to use voice in digital commerce as they have for millennia in other retail settings, from the bazaars of old to the eCommerce capabilities of the 21st century.”