Amazon confirmed on Wednesday that it had laid off nearly 1,000 white-collar workers primarily in its Stores unit–its e-commerce website, news agency Reuters reported, citing a person familiar with the matter. Earlier, Business Insider also reported a job cut at the e-commerce giant.

"We've adjusted parts of ⁠our Stores business because we believe this structure will better enable us to deliver on ⁠our priorities," a spokesperson said in an emailed statement to Reuters.

Key Reason Behind Amazon’s Job Cut

In an interview with Fox News on Wednesday, Amazon founder and executive chairman Jeff Bezos said the company had to continue to cut jobs because it was hiring more than necessary during the pandemic.

When asked bout 30,000 jobs cut in the last round, the executive chairman said: "People were staying home, and they were ordering, and it was an incredible, stressful period for us, by the way."

Employees in the US, UK, and India Impacted

According to Reuters, internal Slack channels indicated that multiple departments in the store, including customer service and sales partner services, and possibly other units within Amazon, were involved.

The job losses included staff from the US, India and the UK.

The holiday for retail units coincides with one of Amazon's biggest shopping days, 'Prime Big Deal Days' and Great Indian Festival sales in India. The discounted shopping days started on Thursday in India, during which a variety of discounts are available.

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Amazon’s 30,0000 Jobs Cut

The 1,000-job cut is the latest in a series of what Amazon said were smaller cuts, following a massive 30,000-job cut that began last year and continued through January. 

Earlier, in January this year, Amazon announced cutting 6,000 jobs worldwide in the second major round of layoffs. According to reports, the layoff was part of restructuring after pandemic-era over-hiring and to expand the adoption of artificial intelligence tools. 

(With Inputs From Reuters)