Amazon India layoffs: Tech giant lays off about 500 employees in web services, HR teams: Report

Amazon is laying off about 500 employees in India across different businesses and functions, multiple people aware of the matter told Economic Times.

As per the report, the process of lay off is ongoing and employees from Amazon Web Services (AWS), human resources, support functions are being laid off. The report also added that this fresh round of layoffs is part of 9,000 jobs cut announcement that was made in March 2023. 

In March, Amazon had revealed its plans to cut around 9,000 jobs from its cloud services, advertising and Twitch units as recession fears loom. The announcement was made by CEO Andy Jassy via a memo to staff mere weeks after the company laid off around 18,000 employees. 

Jassy had said that the company had added substantial amount of staff in the past few years, but the uncertain economy had forced it to choose cost and headcount cuts.

“Given the uncertain economy in which we reside, and the uncertainty that exists in the near future, we have chosen to be more streamlined in our costs and headcount,” he had said in his memo, published later to Amazon’s corporate blog.

“Some may ask why we didn't announce these role reductions with the ones we announced a couple months ago. The short answer is that not all of the teams were done with their analyses in the late fall; and rather than rush through these assessments without the appropriate diligence, we chose to share these decisions as we've made them so people had the information as soon as possible," Jassy was quoted as saying by AP.

In April, Amazon.com Inc. had laid off about 100 employees in its video-game divisions as part of its broader cutbacks, affecting workers at Prime Gaming, Game Growth and the company’s San Diego studio.

Earlier in April, reports also stated that Amazon.com Inc is trimming the number of shares it plans to give employees as part of their 2025 compensation. The memo cited by Insider had also mentioned a possible change in Amazon's pay model that would give staff more cash, which could make up for any potential weakness in its stock price.

(With inputs from agencies)