Amazon CEO Andy Jassy on Wednesday informed employees that the company’s corporate workforce will be substantially reduced in the coming years as the e-commerce giant adopts generative artificial intelligence tools and AI agents.
In a message to employees, Jassy described generative AI as “a once-in-a-lifetime technology” that will transform how the company operates. The CEO of one of the world’s wealthiest tech companies urged employees to learn how to use AI tools and “how to get more done with scrappier teams.”
“We will need fewer people doing some of the jobs that are being done today, and more people doing other types of jobs,” Jassy wrote in the memo. “It’s hard to know exactly where this nets out over time, but in the next few years, we expect that this will reduce our total corporate workforce as we gain efficiency from using AI extensively across the company.”
Experts see Jassy’s memo—addressed to Amazon’s 1.5 million full-time and part-time employees as of the end of March—as a soft launch of the company’s next round of layoffs. Amazon has already laid off tens of thousands of workers in recent years. In 2022, the company laid off 27,000 employees, and more cuts have occurred this year as well.
As tech companies like Amazon roll out AI tools internally and to consumers, Jassy’s message makes one thing clear: artificial intelligence will transform the workforce. However, the hidden message also signals that white-collar jobs, especially at product-based tech companies, are under threat. The high-paying tech jobs that once seemed secure are now at risk due to AI-driven automation, which could make some roles redundant.
Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic—one of the leading companies in the AI space, has warned that AI could eliminate up to half of all entry-level white-collar jobs and push unemployment to 10–20 per cent within the next one to five years. Amodei’s blunt warning has sparked a range of reactions across the internet in recent days.
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Content adapted by the team from the original source: https://indianexpress.com/article/technology/tech-news-technology/amazon-ceo-to-employees-ai-will-shrink-the-companys-workforce-10073233/
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