Amazon unveils latest warehouse robot as tech giants make AI cuts

Amazon has unveiled its latest warehouse robot that can take commands in conversational language, underscoring how AI-powered automation is advancing as companies continue to reduce their workforce in AI-driven companies.

The next generation of technology giant Proteus is a self-driving mobile robot, designed to understand natural language commands from workers and warehouse logistics. It was launched at the company’s Delivering the Future event in London on Thursday.

The original Proteus was installed in Amazon fulfillment centers in 2022 to assist workers, including transporting heavy carts weighing up to 400 kilograms. It is currently being used in 25 fulfillment centers in the US, and the latest version of the robot will be deployed in Europe in the first half of 2027.

Operators will be able to direct the new Proteus in plain language, without technical instructions or a programming interface. It’s part of a broader drive to expand technology in Europe, with Amazon committing to invest 10 billion euros ($11.6 billion) to boost jobs in the region over the next few years.

Other robotics developments include its first touch-sensitive robot, Vulcan, and a robotic tote handling system called STARK.

The announcement comes as Amazon continues to push through layoffs, including cutting 14,000 corporate jobs in October, citing plans to continue investing in its “big bets,” including AI. It said it was laying off another 16,000 workers in January to reduce layers and administration.

CEO Andy Jassy told employees last year that AI would lead to fewer Amazon workers in the coming years.

“We will need fewer people doing some of the jobs that are done today, and there are more people doing other types of jobs,” Jassy said in a memo to employees. “It’s hard to know where this ends up in the long run, but over the next few years, we expect that this will reduce the number of our corporate employees.”

Several tech giants, including Microsoft, Salesforce, again IBMthey were behind thousands of AI layoffs by 2025, with the technology responsible for over 50,000 layoffs in the US within a year. Recently, Block it, The Oracleagain Meta were among the companies that were cut jobs.

“As we’ve invested in robotics, we’ve created hundreds of thousands of jobs,” said Tye Brady., a senior engineer at Amazon Robotics told CNBC on Thursday.

Investments in people, developing skills, and smart machines are creating jobs, Brady said, adding that Amazon is creating jobs at a rate not seen in the US in the past 10 years.

Amazon’s Vice President, Country Manager for the UK and Ireland, John Boumphrey, told CNBC that its investment in robots requires more staff to be hired within fulfillment centers, as the company struggles to hire people with the right skills.

“I would place a big bet that we’re going to need a lot more people in our warehouse in the future… we’re hiring more people in the same area, so, our experience with robots is that they’re driving hiring instead of holding it back,” Boumphrey told CNBC.

However, not everyone is convinced that robots will not lead to the loss of workers.

AI robots are already predicted to outnumber the working population in the next few decades, with one Citi 2024 report showing that they will increase to 1.3 billion by 2035 and more than four billion by 2050.

Rob Garlick, Citi Global Insights’ former head of innovation, technology, and the future of work, told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Europe” in February that leaders will replace workers as robots already have a faster recovery time than humans.

“We have a leadership program in economic terms and business terms that celebrates making a profit,” Garlick said at the time. “If you marry profit with technological advancement, we have the biggest trade-off in history to come, the basis of which is that artificial intelligence will be able to do more, better and better, cheaper and cheaper, and that will be able to replace people.”

The number of young people aged between 16 and 24, who are not in education, employment or training in the UK, reached over one million at the end of May, according to Office for National Statistics data last week.

Young people are facing major challenges in the job market, from AI replacing the entry level to increasing job competition.

Boumphrey said it is a “national problem” with a major challenge that young people are not ready for work.

“It’s a combination of growing up in Covid and the age of smartphones and social media … we’ve raised a generation of young people whose idea of ​​social interaction is to sit in a dark room, be on the phone, and scroll; it’s not their fault.”

Despite AI layoffs and youth unemployment concerns, Boumphrey said Amazon “can’t find enough people to do the skilled jobs we need,” from robotics technicians to mechanical engineers.

The company has created over 6,000 apprenticeships in the UK to address this skills gap and offers employees £3000 a year to train on nationally recognized courses.

Correction: This article has been updated to accurately reflect the reason for Amazon’s layoffs.