Amazon cut jobs inside its robotics division this week, the latest reductions in a sweeping cost-cutting campaign.
In a message to employees on Tuesday, seen by Business Insider, Amazon Robotics VP Scott Dresser described the changes as “difficult but necessary.” He stressed that robotics remains a “strategic priority” even as the company restructures and pares back certain efforts.
It’s unclear how many employees were affected by Tuesday’s cuts. However, the decision underscores that Amazon is still trimming its ranks, even after slashing more than 57,000 corporate roles since late 2022, including rounds of layoffs in October and January.
In parallel, Amazon has been winding down underperforming initiatives, recently closing its Fresh and Go grocery chains after years of experimentation.
An Amazon spokesperson told Business Insider that the company eliminated a “relatively small number of robotics roles” this week. Amazon continues to “hire and invest in strategic areas,” the spokesperson added.
“We regularly review our organizations to make sure teams are best set up to innovate and deliver for our customers,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “We don’t make these decisions lightly, and we’re committed to supporting employees whose roles are affected with severance pay, health insurance benefits, and job placement support.”
Amazon’s vast fulfillment network relies on thousands of robots to shuttle goods across warehouses. But the team recently pulled back on Blue Jay, a warehouse robot project that launched just a few months ago, and is shifting toward a new robotics system, Business Insider previously reported.
After January’s broader layoffs by Amazon, which eliminated 16,000 corporate roles, HR chief Beth Galetti said the company was not aiming to establish “a new rhythm” of sweeping job reductions every few months, though she did not rule out further cuts.
As of the end of last year, Amazon employed about 1.58 million people worldwide, the bulk of them in warehouse and logistics positions. Roughly 350,000 of those workers are in corporate and technology roles.
Amazon has been shrinking its workforce since a pandemic-era hiring spree that dramatically expanded headcount to meet surging demand for e-commerce and cloud services.
CEO Andy Jassy has pushed to strip out layers of management and reshape Amazon’s culture to function more like the “world’s largest startup.” He has set internal goals to flatten the organization and introduced a “no bureaucracy” email alias to crowdsource ideas for operating more efficiently.
Even as it trims staff, Amazon is ramping up spending. The company has projected that capital expenditures could reach $200 billion in 2026, fueled by aggressive investments in AI data centers.
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