Impacted roles in Canada include Amazon Alexa’s development team.
Amazon is reportedly laying off thousands of people starting this week, and its Canadian teams are not exempt.
The New York Times was first to report earlier this week on the retail giant’s downsizing, noting Amazon plans to cut 10,000 jobs In recent days, LinkedIn posts from stated Amazon employees have indicated that the layoffs have begun.
According to some LinkedIn posts, Canadians have been part of the cuts. The posts indicate that those affected include developers for Alexa, Amazon’s voice-controlled assistant device.
Amazon’s stock price has declined by almost 43 percent year to date.
The Verge reported today that senior vice president Dave Limp sent an email to employees on Wednesday confirming the layoffs. In
Per Amazon’s LinkedIn page, it has about 19,800 employees based in Canada. The exact number of Canadian employees impacted by the layoffs at Amazon is unclear.
Amazon did not immediately respond to BetaKit for comment.
The New York Times noted that the 10,000 employee number will likely remain fluid, according to sources familiar with the matter. The cuts would amount to three percent of Amazon’s corporate staff and less than one percent of its global workforce.
Burnaby-based software development engineer Hang Hu wrote on LinkedIn that the entire Alexa-hosted skill team was impacted by the cuts at Amazon.
As reported by The New York Times, the downsizing will focus on Amazon’s devices organization. In addition to Alexa, impacted teams are reported to comprise Amazon’s retail and human resources divisions, among others.
The layoffs at Amazon follows its previous commitment to Canada last year of hiring 1,800 tech and corporate roles by the end of 2021. At that time, it confirmed it had about 25,000 Canadian employees across its fulfillment centres, corporate offices, development centres, and other facilities. Amazon has locations in British Columbia, Ontario, Alberta, Manitoba, and Québec.
RELATED: Amazon to add 1,800 Canadian tech, corporate jobs this year as part of broader hiring plans
Amazon’s stock price has declined by almost 43 percent year to date, trading at $97.77 USD on Nasdaq at the time of publication. This time last year it was trading at $177.04 USD. The change represents a 45 percent dip.
The US retail giant is the latest major tech company to implement mass staff cuts as they go into survival mode amid the macroeconomic downturn.
Last week, Meta’s broad reductions across its organization also affected Canadian employees as part of the 11,000 people laid off last week. And the week prior, Twitter’s job cuts hit its Canadian offices, which saw top levels of its team let go. This includes managing director Paul Burns, director of public policy for Canada Michele Austine, and Twitter Canada communications lead Cam Gordon.
Featured image courtesy Amazon.
