Another round of layoffs has begun at Amazon in Canada, as it moves forward with the plan to lay off 9,000 workers that it announced in March.
Amazon declined to share the size of the layoffs’ impact in Canada.
AWS’ growth has decelerated amid increased competition in the space, paired with the downturn in the technology sector.
Most of the positions being eliminated are at Amazon Web Services (AWS), People Experience and Technology (PXT), advertising, and Twitch.
Termination of affected roles started on Wednesday, according to two separate internal memos obtained by BetaKit and sent from AWS CEO Adam Selipsky and PXT’s senior Vice-President Beth Galetti. They noted that layoffs also affected their teams in the US and Costa Rica.
AWS reportedly had about 135,000 to 136,000 employees in January, per its LinkedIn, and now has approximately 125,000 across its global offices. This represents a reduction of around 11,000 roles in the last two months across the cloud division. Amazon’s LinkedIn page currently lists about 1,100 employees that are part of PXT globally.
This round of layoffs were made in addition to the 18,000 positions that were eliminated across Amazon in January this year, as well as the 10,000 company-wide cuts in 2022, which also affected its workforce in Canada.
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy previously wrote in March that these employee reductions were a “difficult decision,” though it is “one that we think is best for the company long term.” He added that for several years leading up to 2023, most of Amazon’s businesses have added a significant amount of staff.
AWS, for example, grew significantly, according to Selipsky. He wrote in his statement to employees that these role eliminations were a result of “putting our resources behind our top priorities–those things that matter most to customers and that will move the needle for our businesses.”
Jassy wrote that the reduction in costs and headcount at the company occurred because of “the uncertain economy in which we reside, and the uncertainty that exists in the near future.”
AWS is among the leading providers of cloud services, taking up an estimated 39 percent of market share in 2021.
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With added competition in the space, paired with the downturn in the technology sector, AWS’s growth has decelerated. It missed revenue projections in Q4 2022, generating $21.4 billion compared to analysts’ estimates of $21.87 billion.
This deceleration in growth has been spreading as the economic downturn continues to put a squeeze on businesses’ liquidity. As organizations rein in spending, employees in Canada and beyond are hit with layoffs.
In February, Alphabet began making cuts to its team in Canada as part of its organization-wide termination of 12,000 staff. Layoffs at Shopify last year affected approximately 1,000 employees.