Amazon lays off hundreds, pointing to Jeff Bezos' focus on Alexa
Amazon sells clothes and other fun products, but in 2018, the tech giant is doubling down on technology.
The latest sign: Amazon plans to lay off hundreds of employees, primarily in the consumer retail side of the business, the Seattle Times reported Monday, citing two anonymous sources familiar with the matter.
Amazon confirmed the layoffs and noted that the company is focusing on certain areas of the business but is still growing in overall employee count. Amazon's workforce is currently 566,000 people. Beyond roles in warehouses, it has 12,500 open jobs listed on Monday, the Seattle Times noted.
“As part of our annual planning process, we are making head count adjustments across the company — small reductions in a couple of places and aggressive hiring in many others,” an Amazon spokesperson told the Seattle Times in a statement. “For affected employees, we work to find roles in the areas where we are hiring.”
Recent moves, including these layoffs, point to Amazon's move away from consumer retail, as in creating and selling its own merchandise. Amazon-owned Zappos, a footwear company, recently laid off about 30 people. Diapers.com's Quidsi, also owned by Amazon, laid off 250 people last year, the Seattle Times noted.
That strategy aligns with CEO Jeff Bezos's own words. During the company's quarterly earnings report earlier this month, Bezos said he was focused on Alexa and its future.
CEO Jeff Bezos highlighted Alexa in the earnings report. "Our 2017 projections for Alexa were very optimistic, and we far exceeded them. We don’t see positive surprises of this magnitude very often — expect us to double down,” Bezos said in a prepared statement.
Amazon Web Services (AWS) continues to be an important part of the company's overall revenue. Amazon brought in $60.5 billion in revenue for the fourth quarter of 2017, with AWS accounting for $5.11 billion of that total.
Meanwhile, Amazon is close to launching Shipping With Amazon, a national delivery service that would compete with FedEx and United Parcel Service (UPS), according to a recent Wall Street Journal report.
Amazon's layoffs are still ongoing and are expected to be completed over the coming weeks, the Seattle Times reported.
Topics Amazon Amazon Alexa
Kerry Flynn is a business reporter for Mashable covering the tech industry. She previously reported on social media companies, mobile apps and startups for International Business Times. She has also written for The Huffington Post, Forbes and Money magazine. Kerry studied environmental science and economics at Harvard College, where she led The Harvard Crimson's metro news and design teams and played mellophone in the Band. When not listening to startup pitches, she runs half-marathons, plays with puppies and pretends to like craft beer.
