Amazon Web Services Inc. is letting go hundreds of employees across its sales, training and retail technology groups, GeekWire reported today.

The cloud giant confirmed the layoffs in a statement without commenting on the number of affected staffers. The job cuts follow two larger workforce reductions that AWS parent Amazon.com Inc. carried out last year. AWS was among the business units affected by the more recent of those workforce reductions, which took place last March and saw the company cut 9,000 jobs.

The restructuring effort detailed today will reportedly see the Amazon unit axe “hundreds” of positions at its Sales, Marketing, and Global Services organization. Some of the affected employees support AWS’ sales operations. Others focus on providing training and certifications to customers.

According to GeekWire, the job cuts are part of a broader reorganization at the unit. AWS will reportedly shift its focus providing training in a self-service format and through partners. The cloud giant also cited “overlap” between some program management and sales operations roles as a factor behind the layoffs.

“We do not take these decisions lightly, and I know change can be difficult,” Matt Garman, AWS’ senior vice president of sales and marketing, wrote in an internal memo. “We operate in an incredibly fast-moving industry, and it is important that we stay agile as an organization.”

The workforce reduction is also said to affect AWS’ Physical Stores Technology group, which develops technology for parent Amazon’s retail stores. It’s believed some members of the group’s identity and checkout teams will leave their current roles.

The development comes only a day after Amazon disclosed plans to remove its Just Walk Out checkout system from its Fresh grocery stores. The system, which debuted in 2016, detects when shoppers take an item off a shelf and adds it to their bill when they walk out the store. The technology thus removes the need to wait in checkout lines.

Amazon reportedly plans to replace Just Walk Out with Dash Carts, smart shopping carts that it introduced in 2020. The carts likewise enable shoppers to skip the checkout line. Built-in sensors detect when customers add an item and can also weigh it when needed.

“We’ve learned a lot through the launch of identity and checkout technologies in our large format Amazon Fresh stores, and have good customer feedback to inform our plans going forward,” Dilip Kumar, vice president of AWS applications, told employees. “We are also expanding our identity and checkout technologies in smaller-format 1P stores, and growing our third-party locations.”

Affected employees in the U.S. will receive at least 60 days’ worth of severance pay, transitional health benefits and outplacement support. AWS is reportedly “working to find internal opportunities” for the impacted staffers. It’s believed the cloud giant, which grew its revenue by 13% year-over-year last quarter, currently has thousands of open positions.

Photo: Tony Webster/Flickr