In early 2026, this nascent wave of discontent begins to find its way into the battle of hearts and minds at Indian place, alongside panic, confusion and anxiety in the Indian company ecosystem. After grim news of Amazon laying off 16,000 employees and a general news that they would lay off 16,000 workers, Bengaluru-based Ola Electric in Bengaluru announced that it will be cutting nearly 5 percent of its global workforce. The move, which the company said Tuesday will hit nearly 620 employees, is a bracing start of the year for technology as well as automotive markets.
The Clash: A Double-Edged Sword War At Ola Electric
“The main reason for certain job reductions is increased automation,” Bhavish Aggarwal, chief executive officer Ola Electric, said in an interview with The New India Times. Structural restructuring is said to be occurring throughout the company to build a leaner and more profit driven organization.
Front-End Automation
The biggest portions are on the front of operations, leaning more heavily on AI and automation tools to increase speed, discipline, and operations performance.
Service Turnaround
The fact that this rate of reduction is also occurring in line with Ola's reparations for the notorious service delays. The company claims to have more than 80% of the service requests (the 'Ola Business' in this case) met that same day as a re-programming of 'Hyperservice'.
Cut History: Ola has been adamant about down-sized operations. It laid off some 1,000 people in March 2025 with turnover rates close to 54 percent compared to prior years by fiscal 2024-25: the total proportion from market for Fy 25-26 reduced to single digits from 35 percent.
Last year, though, marks a time for a “business turnaround,” this report says. Amazon said it would eliminate 16,000 corporate jobs around the world in a few cities including at the company’s offices in Bengaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad. What types of layoffs have targeted:
- Amazon Web Services (AWS);
- Human Resources; Prime Video.
Why They Did It
Ola said it had to do this, as per what the company said to me it was to take away the bureaucracy, cutting and getting rid of the "bureaucracy" in its structure and as a result, their decision-making structure is changed relatively fast to Generative AI which will enable Amazon to perform mundane, simple tasks like administrative tasks and coding.
Transition Summary Tech Job Crisis
- Automation: AI in Frontend - Not just Human Jobs in Frontend System; Companies Are Pounding With AI-Powered
- Profitability Efforts: Investors now want shorter turnaround times and bigger earning potential.
- Scale – Growth: Ola is looking to move from a strong growth model towards an improvement on the customer journey - through a more tech driven small company that has a focus on customer experience in the future.
