Amazon To Shut Down Online Learning Vertical In India

Looks like the business sentiment in the Indian edtech segment has touched giants like Amazon in India. Going with the downward trend in the segment, now Amazon India is also shutting down its online learning vertical, Amazon Academy. The ecommerce giant will wind down the edtech service in the country in a phased manner starting August 2023.

Amazon India will fully refund the fee for those who signed up for the current academic batch, as per media reports.

However, subscribers to Amazon Academy’s content will have access to full course material online for an extended period of a year, until October 2024.

Amazon India officially entered the test-prep space with its learning platform last year. However, it was beta testing the edtech product since 2019.

The app has been helping students take mock tests to prepare for Indian entrance exams, including JEE (Joint Entrance Examination), both Mains and Advanced, and offered curated learning material, live lectures.

Amazon Academy’s foray into the test prep market was also seen as a direct competition to other edtech apps such as Unacademy, BYJU’S, Vedantu, Testbook and others.

Overall, the edtech segment in India has been the worst hit this year. The segment also saw operations of startups including Brainly, Lido Learning, Crejo.Fun, Udayy and SuperLearn being shut down.

In 2022 alone, edtech startups have cumulatively laid off more than 7,500 employees.

“At Amazon, we think big, experiment, and invest in new ideas to delight customers. We also continually evaluate the progress and potential of our products and services to deliver customer value, and we regularly make adjustments based on those assessments,” company spokesperson said as quoted in the reports.

“Following an assessment, we have made the decision to discontinue Amazon Academy. We are winding down this program in a phased manner to take care of current customers,” the spokesperson added.

Amid its ongoing cost-cutting exercise, Amazon recently decided to cut 10,000 jobs in corporate and technology verticals globally. With India accounting for about 7% of the company’s total headcount of over 1.5 Mn, the layoffs exercise is expected to impact hundreds of its employees in the country.

Interestingly, in this matter, the Labour Ministry summoned an official of the ecommerce giant in Bengaluru on Wednesday.

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