‘This generation of AI is the most transformative technology we’ve seen since the internet. It’s enabling companies to innovate much faster than ever before,’ says Amazon executive Beth Galetti concerning the layoff of 14,000 corporate employees.
Amazon confirmed that it will lay off 14,000 corporate employees as part of major organizational changes across the tech giant, with employees learning Tuesday if they will be let go.
“There will be communications from leaders to those teams and individuals today, but we also wanted to share the broader context about what’s happening and why,” said Beth Galetti, senior vice president of People Experience and Technology at Amazon, in a letter to employees Tuesday.
“While this will include reducing in some areas and hiring in others, it will mean an overall reduction in our corporate workforce of approximately 14,000 roles,” she said.
Why Is Amazon Laying Off Corporate Employees?
Regarding why the $168 billion Seattle-based tech giant is “reducing roles” when the company is performing well, Galetti pointed to AI innovation.
“This generation of AI is the most transformative technology we’ve seen since the internet,” she said. “It’s enabling companies to innovate much faster than ever before [in existing market segments and new ones],” said Galetti.
[Related: Amazon’s Outage Root Cause, $581M Loss Potential And ‘Apology:’ 5 AWS Outage Takeaways]
“We’re convinced that we need to be organized more leanly, with fewer layers and more ownership, to move as quickly as possible for our customers and business,” she said.
What Led To Amazon’s New Layoff Round?
Amazon, which includes its AWS cloud business, said many employees over the last year have “put significant effort into that work of strengthening your organizations by reducing layers, increasing ownership, and helping reduce bureaucracy,” Galetti said.
Because of this effort, Amazon is seeing great results by being able to have teams move faster, she said.
“The reductions we’re sharing today are a continuation of this work to get even stronger by further reducing bureaucracy, removing layers and shifting resources to ensure we’re investing in our biggest bets,” said Galetti.
Amazon Will ‘Continue Hiring In ‘Key’ Areas
Looking ahead to 2026, Amazon said it expects to “continue hiring in key strategic areas.”
However, the company said it will continue to find “additional places [where] we can remove layers, increase ownership and realize efficiency gains,” said Galetti.
Galetti touted Amazon’s innovation and vision while discussing the layoffs.
“I don’t know of any other company with the breadth of Amazon, the number of exciting bold bets we’re making, and all the ways we can make customers’ lives better and easier around the world,” said Galetti.
Amazon Employees Being Laid Off
The tech giant said it is offering most employees 90 days to look for a new role internally.
Amazon said its own recruiting teams will prioritize internal candidates to help as many people as possible find new roles within Amazon.
“For our teammates who are unable to find a new role at Amazon or who choose not to look for one, we’ll offer them transition support including severance pay, outplacement services, health insurance benefits and more,” said Galetti.
Andy Jassy Says AI Will ‘Reduce Our Total Corporate Workforce’
This month, Amazon reportedly laid off up to 15 percent of its staff in its human resources division with additional layoffs in other divisions.
In a companywide letter to employees in June, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said that the company expects to “reduce” its corporate workforce due to “efficiency gains” in artificial intelligence.
“As we roll out more Generative AI and agents, it should change the way our work is done. We will need fewer people doing some of the jobs that are being done today and more people doing other types of jobs,” said Jassy in his letter to employees.
“It’s hard to know exactly where this nets out over time, but in the next few years we expect that this will reduce our total corporate workforce as we get efficiency gains from using AI extensively across the company,” Amazon’s CEO said.
Jassy said the company plans to spend $100 billion in capital expenditures in 2025 in a move to expand its AI and cloud data centers.
