Amazon on Friday announced the company is cutting jobs at its Alexa voice assistant unit, citing “shifting” business priorities and shifting focus to generative artificial intelligence.
The job cuts will impact “several hundred” employees working on Alexa, Reuters reported.
“We’re shifting some of our efforts to better align with our business priorities, and what we know matters most to customers – which includes maximizing our resources and efforts focused on generative AI,” vice president of Alexa and Fire TV, Daniel Rausch, said.
“These shifts are leading us to discontinue some initiatives.”
Over the past week, Amazon has been cutting back in a number of areas, including its gaming and music operations as well as certain HR positions.
According to a spokeswoman, while the majority of the impacted roles were in the devices company, some were working on Alexa-related items in a different section. Many companies are focusing their efforts on generative AI, which can produce long text responses and software code based on brief instructions.
