Amazon Games lays off around 180 employees in second wave of cuts

Games division once again part of larger restructuring efforts

Amazon Games has laid off around 180 employees according to Reuters, culling even more jobs than during the first wave of layoffs back in April 2023, which already cost around 100 workers their positions. These job cuts came as part of a larger restructuring effort going on at the corporation, which saw layoffs at other divisions just last week. Throughout the entire year, Amazon laid off about 27,000 people overall.

Reuters cited an email sent out to employees by Amazon Games VP Christoph Hartmann on Monday, justifying the cuts: “After our initial restructuring in April, it became clear that we needed to focus our resources even more on the areas that are growing with the highest potential to drive our business forward. [...] I recognize that this is the second time this year that you are hearing about org-wide team changes and seeing colleagues go, so let me be very clear when I say this: I remain confident in our future.”

Amazon Games has laid off additional employees / Amazon Games

Amazon Games is working on the offerings of Prime Gaming, the video games-related part of the Amazon Prime membership, which contains monthly in-game benefits for games like EA Sports FC 24 and Pokémon Go alongside a growing library of freely accessible titles, such as classic RPG Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic in November 2023.

According to the mail cited by Reuters, Amazon wants to focus its Prime benefits around this aspect, since the free games are what customers like most about the service.

Another remaining focus of the company is developing and publishing MMOs with the Western releases of Blue Protocol and Throne & Liberty being in the hands of Amazon and a brand-new open-world Lord of the Rings MMO being made internally.

Add this piece of news to the reasons some of us can’t get excited about The Game Awards 2023.