Amazon is the latest in a long list of U.S. technology companies to announce major job cuts.
Amazon said that it will be cutting about 18,000 positions. It’s the largest set of layoffs in the Seattle-based company’s history.
“Amazon has weathered uncertain and difficult economies in the past, and we will continue to do so,” CEO Andy Jassy said in a note to employees that the company made public. “These changes will help us pursue our long-term opportunities with a stronger cost structure.”
He said the layoffs will mostly impact the company’s Amazon Stores division — which a spokesman said encompasses its e-commerce business as well as company’s brick-and-mortar stores such as Amazon Fresh and Amazon Go — and its PXT organizations, which handle human resources and other functions.
In November, Jassy told staff that layoffs were coming due to the economic landscape. The company had also offered voluntary buyouts and has been cutting costs in other areas of its sprawling business.
Salesforce, meanwhile, said it is laying off about 8,000 employees.
The cuts announced Wednesday are by far the largest in the 23-year history of a San Francisco company founded by former Oracle executive Marc Benioff. Benioff pioneered the method of leasing software services to internet-connected devices — a concept now known as “cloud computing.”
The layoffs are being made on the heels of a shake-up in Salesforce’s top ranks. Benioff’s hand-picked co-CEO Bret Taylor, who also was Twitter’s chairman at the time of it $44 billion sale to billionaire Elon Musk, left Salesforce. Then, Slack co-founder Stewart Butterfield left. Salesforce bought Slack two years ago for nearly $28 billion.
Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg also announced in November that his company would be laying off 11,000 employees.
Like other major tech companies, Salesforce has taken a major blow on its stock. Before Wednesday’s announcement, shares had plunged more 50% from their peak close to $310 in November 2021. The shares gained nearly 4% Wednesday to close at $139.59.
“This is a smart poker move by Benioff to preserve margins in an uncertain backdrop as the company clearly overbuilt out its organization over the past few years along with the rest of the tech sector with a slowdown now on the horizon,” Wedbush analyst Dan Ives wrote.
Salesforce also said Wednesday that it will be closing some of its offices, but didn’t include locations. The company’s 61-story headquarters is a prominent feature of the San Francisco skyline and a symbol of tech’s importance to the city since its completion in 2018.
