Amazon plans to lay off 10,000 employees starting this week: NYT

Amazon.com is planning to lay off about 10,000 employees in corporate and technology jobs starting as soon as this week, the New York Times reported on Monday (Nov 14), citing people with knowledge of the matter.

The job cuts will focus on the e-commerce giant's devices unit, which houses voice-assistant Alexa, as well as its retail division and human resources, according to the report, which also said the total number of layoffs remains fluid.

The unit that houses Alexa had posted an operating loss of more than US$5 billion a year, with Amazon mulling if it should focus on adding new capabilities when customers use the device for only a few functions.

The company did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.

The layoffs represent about 3 per cent of its corporate staff, the Times reported. Amazon had recently said it would freeze hiring to corporate workforce for the next few months.

The news comes just weeks after Amazon warned of a slowdown in growth for the busy holiday season when it generates the highest sales, saying consumers and businesses had less money to spend due to rising prices.

Amazon is the latest US company to make deep cuts to its employee base to brace for a potential economic downturn.

Last week, Facebook-parent Meta Platforms said it would cut more than 11,000 jobs, or 13 per cent of its workforce, to rein in costs. Other companies include Elon Musk-owned Twitter, Microsoft Corp and Snap.

Slowing economic growth and rising cost of labour and transportation have hobbled companies that had hired aggressively during the pandemic when the demand for e-commerce to cloud-based services had surged.

Now with consumer demand taking a hit from rising prices and borrowing costs, many are considering job cuts.

Shares of Amazon, which have lost about 40 per cent of their value so far this year, briefly pared losses and were last trading down 2 per cent.