'Difficult decision': Amazon CEO says more layoffs will happen in 2023

Andy Jassy's memo does not say how many people would be impacted as company reviews business plans

Amazon will cut jobs again in early 2023, said chief executive officer Andy Jassy in a memo to his employees as he announced the annual planning process will be extended.

“Those decisions will be shared with impacted employees and organizations early in 2023,” said Jassy on Thursday, meaning there will be more role reductions.

According to a report in the 'New York Times', Amazon plans to lay off about 10,000 employees. However, Jassy’s memo did not specify how many people would be impacted.

He said the company has not concluded yet exactly how many roles will be impacted, but each leader will communicate to their teams when they have the details.

 

“We will prioritize communicating directly with impacted employees before making broad public or internal announcements,” said Jassy.

The e-commerce firm is in the middle of an annual operating planning review and based on that it would decide about role eliminations. The firm has already paused new incremental hires in the corporate workforce.

“We are looking at each of our businesses and would make decisions about what we believe we should change,” said Jassy.

Leaders across the company are working with their teams and looking at their workforce and investments. Jassy said this year’s review is difficult as the firm had hired rapidly in the last several years before the US economy came to a "challenging spot".

“Yesterday, we communicated the difficult decision to eliminate a number of positions across our Devices and Books businesses,” said Jassy.

Amazon also announced a voluntary reduction offer for some employees in the People, Experience, and Technology (PXT) organization.

Jassy said he has been in the CEO role now for about a year and a half and layoffs were the most difficult decision the company has made during that time. He said it is not lost on him these aren’t just roles that the company is eliminating…“but rather, people with emotions, ambitions, and responsibilities whose lives will be impacted.”