Amazon is laying off more employees in its advertising unit, extending job cuts that have been going on for the past 18 months, an internal email obtained by Business Insider said.
The email, dated March 26, said affected employees will get 60 days — or 90 days if they are in New York or New Jersey — to find a new role within Amazon. If they can’t find a position during that time, “your employment with Amazon will come to an end,” the company wrote in the email.
It added that impacted employees will receive full pay and benefits during this period. Amazon also offers support from the recruiting firm Lee Hecht Harrison to help affected employees find new jobs outside the company.
“We are taking the difficult step of reducing some roles across some Amazon Ads teams,” the email to affected employees said. “Unfortunately, your role has been eliminated.”
In an email to BI, Amazon’s spokesperson confirmed the job cuts, adding that “up to 160 roles” may be impacted globally.
“We regularly review the structure of our teams and make adjustments based on the needs of the business and to prioritize investments in experiences that matter most to customers. Following a recent review, we’ve made the difficult decision to eliminate a relatively small number of roles on our Advertising team. We’re grateful to these employees for their contributions, and we’re focused on supporting them in their next steps,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
The job losses are the latest in Amazon’s long, cost-cutting effort that started in late 2022. The company has announced at least 27,000 layoffs since then and has eliminated more roles this year across its Prime Video, Twitch, Audible, and healthcare units.
Amazon also put more people on its performance-improvement plans when the layoffs started, potentially affecting more employees, BI previously reported.
In February, Brian Olsavsky, the CFO of Amazon, declined to say whether the layoffs were over and hinted at future job cuts.
“I think we are very careful on our investments,” Olsavsky said during a call with reporters. “We are investing, and we are adding in some areas, but there’s a general feeling in most teams that we’re looking to hold the line on head count, perhaps go down, as we can drive efficiencies in the size of our business.”
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