Amazon lays off dozens of employees working on its long-awaited drone project

Share to friends
Listen to this article

Amazon.com Inc Thursday introduced it had laid off dozens of employees working on its supply drone project Amazon Prime Air, turning to exterior producers to assist construct the units as a substitute.

“We are reorganizing one small team within our larger Prime Air organization to allow us to best align with the needs of our customers and the business,” Amazon spokeswoman Kristen Kish stated in an announcement, with out offering a quantity on what number of employees will probably be sacked.

Kish stated the corporate was working to search out roles for the affected employees “in the areas where we are hiring”.

The affected employees have been its Research and Development employees in addition to manufacturing employees working on the drone project.

The tech large has reached tentative offers with Austria’s FACC Aerospace and Spain’s Aernnova Aerospace to fabricate elements for its Amazon Prime Air, the Financial Times reported

FACC and Aernnova specialise in manufacturing plane elements for the aviation business. Some of their shoppers embody Airbus, Boeing, and Bombardier.

The full phrases of the cope with the producers are but to be finalized, in keeping with Financial Times, citing an individual aware of the plan.

Last 12 months, Amazon despatched out a “request for proposal” to a number of firms, which means extra offers with different producers may be reached quickly, sources stated.

Amazon has been working on the supply drone since 2013. It plans to make use of the drones to ship items weighing as much as 5 kilos in below half-hour to its hundreds of thousands of clients. The firm obtained U.S approval in August to start testing business deliveries within the nation.