The Echo business has always looked like Amazon playing the long game from the outside. Above all, the company’s home consumer hardware is a convenient vessel for getting Alexa into millions of homes. But when a corporation is doing some serious belt tightening amid broader economic headwinds, no divisions are safe from cost cutting — certainly not one that is reportedly operating at a $5 billion a year revenue loss.
The Wall Street Journal this week noted that Amazon’s devices group could be the latest to get hit with cuts as the company braces for further macroeconomic disruption. The paper notes that “Amazon’s leadership is closely evaluating its Alexa business, according to some of the people,” citing internal documents.
Many of the cutbacks thus far have been focused on longer-tail products. Devices is a mature division for the company, however, encompassing a wide range of Echo home devices, Fire tablets and Kindles, among others.
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