Amazon to create 1,000 skilled tech roles in Ireland

Amazon will be creating around 1,000 jobs across its Irish offices in the next two years, in skilled tech roles such as software development engineers and datacentre technicians.

The new roles are partly a bid to support Ireland economically in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, and will be spread across the firm’s sites in Cork and Dublin, increasing the retail giant’s employees in the region to 5,000.

Pointing out Amazon’s ongoing investment in Ireland, Mike Beary, AWS Ireland country manager, said: “We have seen a surge in demand for cloud services in Ireland and globally, and we are excited to add 1,000 highly skilled roles so we can continue to help our customers to innovate, especially in this difficult time, and work towards building a robust digital economy for the future.”

While some retailers have struggled during the coronavirus pandemic as people have been increasingly forced to stay at home, online retailers have not been in the same boat, with consumers shifting towards online shopping during lockdown – earlier in the year, Amazon claimed it would be investing around $4bn of its projected second-quarter profit into coronavirus response, including investing in meeting increased customer demand and measures to protect staff.

Recruitment has also been a mixed bag during the outbreak, with some firms having to reduce their staff numbers while others ramp up employment. Earlier in the year, Amazon announced plans to recruit 100,000 full- and part-time staff in its US fulfilment centres to cope with lockdown shopping.

Outside of the pandemic, Amazon has ongoing plans to encourage more people into tech roles. In Ireland, the firm has partnerships with the Dublin Institute of Technology, Dublin City University, and the University of Limerick to provide free content to promote cloud computing skills through AWS Educate, and recently launched an initiative called AWS GetIT to introduce teens in Ireland to cloud computing and digital skills.

Amazon’s new roles in Ireland will be tech-focused, including roles such as big data specialists, security specialists, solutions architects, database engineers, Dev Ops engineers, software development engineers, network development engineers, systems development engineers, optical deployment engineers, data centre technicians, as well as technical and non-technical program managers, and account managers, and roles in technical management or senior leadership across both Amazon and Amazon Web Services (AWS).

Much like consumers, most people have been forced to turn to technology during lockdown to keep businesses up and running, as well as to support employees as they work from home.

Research has found the pandemic has led to a number of IT leaders increasing their adoption of cloud computing technologies during the shift to remote working.

As well as increasing the number of tech roles in its Ireland locations, Amazon’s new Charlemont Square campus, which will be the base for AWS’s expanding cloud computing talent, is set to open in 2022.

Even before the outbreak hit, Amazon was investing in a wind farm project in Ireland in a bid to make its facilities run more sustainably, which is set to open in September of 2020.

Taoiseach Micheál Martin said of Amazon’s new roles across Ireland: “The government’s mission over the coming months and years is to rebuild our society and economy in the post-Covid world. We need to get people back to work and to protect and create sustainable jobs. This announcement is an important and welcome step in that journey.”