Amazon is planning a heavy wave of layoffs starting Tuesday impacting as many as 30,000 corporate jobs, according to a Reuters report.
The e-commerce and web services giant and parent of Amazon MGM Studios and Prime Video is still working to pare down after over hiring during Covid. The cuts will likely cut across divisions.
Layoffs of that degree would represent roughly 10% of the company’s 350,000 corporate employees. Its total global workforce, of some 1.5 million full time and part time, is much larger and comprised largely of warehouse employees. Reuters said the cuts would represent the largest round of layoffs at Amazon since some 27,000 jobs were eliminated starting in late 2022, and that managers are undergoing training Monday on communicating with staff ahead of pink slips that will begin to hit email inboxes Tuesday morning. Other reports said the total number hasn’t yet been determined.
RELATED: Amazon Reorganizes Audio Divisions, Shrinking Wondery Studio And Laying Off 100-Plus Staffers
Amazon in August reorganized its audio divisions, laying off more than 100 workers and dramatically narrowing the scope of its Wondery studio. It January of 2024, it laid off several hundred employees across Prime Video and Amazon Studios as part of a review of its business.
Amazon reps were’t immediately available to comment.
The report comes as the company is one of several circling Warner Bros. Discovery, which formally put itself up for sale last week after receiving interest from multiple parties.
It wasn’t clear if the cuts were AI-related, but CEO Andy Jassy has warned that Generative AI will change the way work is done at the company. It will require “fewer people doing some of the jobs that are being done today, and more people doing other types of jobs,” he said in a memo to staff in June.
