The world’s largest tech company Amazon is going to lay off about 15 percent of the employees in its Human Resource (HR) department this festive season. This department within the company is called the People Experience and Technology (PXT) team, which includes recruiting, technology, and traditional HR functions. Amazon’s PXT team employs more than 10,000 people, and these layoffs will impact them the most. Apart from this, there may be cuts in other departments of the company as well, but it has not been confirmed yet how many people will be affected.
reason for layoff
Amazon, under the leadership of its CEO Andy Jassy, has decided to invest heavily in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and cloud technology. This year, the company will invest more than $100 billion in capital to build AI-enabled data centers and cloud infrastructure. Due to this change, Amazon may have to reduce the number of employees so that expenses can be controlled and the company can get more benefits from AI and technology. CEO Jassy has also made it clear that the use of AI will reduce the number of employees, and the employees who keep pace with AI will remain a part of the company while some positions will be cut.
Impact of last round of layoffs and upcoming challenges
Amazon faced the biggest round of layoffs after the Corona epidemic in 2022-23, in which about 27,000 employees had to be laid off. The current layoffs are even more strategic due to increased reliance on AI and technology. Along with this, the company has also cut employees in many divisions like consumer devices, podcast and AWS.
CEO Andy Jassy has already warned employees that AI-based change could lead to headcount loss and urged everyone to embrace AI and new technologies to better position themselves in the company’s new era.