YouTube is undergoing a staffing shakeup as the company pivots to focus on artificial intelligence, offering its US-based employees voluntary buyout packages with severance.
The online video platform, which launched in 2005, is restructuring its products team for the first time since 2015, according to an internal memo from YouTube CEO Neal Mohan, as parent company Google‘s CEO Sundar Pichai has urged staff to embrace AI for increased productivity.
“Looking to the future, the next frontier for YouTube is AI,” said a YouTube spokesperson in a statement published by CNBC, noting that no roles are being eliminated with the restructure.
With the restructure, Mohan will directly oversee three product groups, with Christian Oestlien leading the subscription products division, which encompasses YouTube Music and Premium, YouTube TV, Primetime Channels, Podcasts and Commerce; and Chief Product Officer Johanna Voolich is heading up the viewer products team, which covers YouTube’s main app, Living Room, Search and Discovery, YouTube Kids, Learning and Trust and Safety.
This week, Amazon announced it was laying off 14,000 employees with more jobs expected to be cut as the company also embraces AI.
In a memo shared publicly, Beth Galetti, SVP of People Experience and Technology at Amazon, said “the world is changing quickly. This generation of AI is the most transformative technology we’ve seen since the Internet, and it’s enabling companies to innovate much faster than ever before (in existing market segments and altogether new ones). We’re convicted that we need to be organized more leanly, with fewer layers and more ownership, to move as quickly as possible for our customers and business.”
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