Where Amazon Finds, and Loses, AI Talent

In the hunt for artificial intelligence talent, Amazon swaps employees with its Seattle neighbor Microsoft on a roughly one-for-one ratio. But it loses far more AI-oriented talent to Google than it gains from that firm, new data show.

Amazon poached about a dozen AI-related people from Google in the five years ending April 2017. But Google lured 132 people with AI skills from Amazon in the same period, according to research firm Paysa. In contrast, Amazon hired 124 people from Microsoft in the period but lost 123. The figures also show a steady flow of people between Amazon and numerous other tech firms, including Yahoo, Oracle, Facebook and Apple. (See chart above.)