New Delhi:

Amazon is planning to lay off thousands of employees and implement cost-cutting measures as the last few quarters haven’t been profitable, according to reports. The company could fire as many as 10,000 employees starting as soon as this week, reports New York Times.

If the total number of layoffs stays around 10,000, it would be the biggest layoff in the history of Amazon. It would represent less than 1 per cent of the workforce of the company which employs over 1.6 million globally.

The job cuts would focus on Amazon’s devices unit, which houses voice-assistant Alexa, and its retail and human resources division, the NYT report said.

Amazon, after a months-long review, has cautioned employees in some unprofitable units to look for other opportunities within the company, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Amazon is closely evaluating its Alexa business and is currently considering whether it should focus on trying to add new capabilities to the voice assistant, which is available on a variety of Amazon devices, the report added.

The report comes just weeks after the e-commerce giant warned of a slowdown in growth for the busy holiday season, a period when it used to generate the highest sales. Amazon said this was because consumers and businesses have less money to spend due to rising prices.

After experiencing its “most profitable era on record” during the COVID-19 pandemic years, which saw exponential growth in online consumer spending, “Amazon’s growth slowed to the lowest rate in two decades, as the bullwhip of the pandemic snapped,” the NYT report said.

Amazon is the latest technology company to make deep cuts to its employee base to brace for a potential economic downturn.

Last week, Twitter cut roughly 50% of its workforce following its sale to Elon Musk. Facebook’s parent company Meta also fired 11,000 employees.