Seattle, Jan. 5 (BNA): Amazon’s layoffs will now increase to more than 18,000 jobs as part of a previously disclosed workforce cut, CEO Andy Jassy said in a memo to public officials.
He said the layoffs, which Amazon will announce starting January 18, will greatly affect the company’s e-commerce and human resources organizations.
The cuts amount to 6% of Amazon’s roughly 300,000-strong workforce and represent a quick turnaround for the retailer, which recently doubled its base pay cap to compete more aggressively for talent.
Amazon has more than 1.5 million workers including warehouse employees, making it the second largest private employer in America after Wal-Mart.
Its stock rose 2% in after-hours trading.
In the memo, Jassy said annual planning “was more challenging given the uncertain economy and that we’ve been hiring quickly over the past several years.”
Amazon braced for likely slower growth as high inflation encouraged companies and consumers to cut spending and its share price halved in the past year.
The company began letting employees go in November from its hardware division, and a source told Reuters at the time it was targeting about 10,000 cuts.
The tech industry will shed more than 150,000 workers in 2022, according to tracking website Layoffs.fyi, and it’s a number that continues to grow. Salesforce Inc said on Wednesday that it plans to cut about 10% of the staff, which numbered about 8,000 as of Oct. 31.
The reversal of Amazon’s fortunes was stark. It has changed from a company considered essential during the pandemic to deliver goods to closed homes, to a hyper-demand company. The layoffs have now surpassed the 11,000 cuts announced last year by Facebook subsidiary Meta Platforms Inc (META.O).
Jassy’s remark followed a report in the Wall Street Journal that the cut would be more than 17,000 jobs. He said Amazon chose to disclose the news before informing affected employees why the leak had occurred.
Amazon still has to file certain legal notices about the mass layoffs, and it plans to pay severance pay.
“Amazon has navigated difficult and uncertain economies in the past, and we will continue to do so,” Jassy said.