Today, Amazon announced a $1 billion global investment in its Career Choice programme to prepare hundreds of thousands of operations employees for in-demand careers of the future, and pledged to quadruple its Supported Internship programme in the UK, supporting more than one thousand young people with learning disabilities and autism into work, by 2030.
The commitments, unveiled at the company's Delivering the Future event in Dartford, London and part of Amazon's $2.5 billion Future Ready 2030 pledge, reflect two sides of the same ambition: equipping people with the skills to thrive as AI and automation reshape the world of work, and ensuring those who face the biggest barriers to employment are not left behind.
Reshaping Career Choice to prepare employees for the future of work
Career Choice is Amazon's flagship upskilling programme, designed to empower employees to learn new skills for career success at Amazon or elsewhere, providing access to education and training opportunities that prepare them for in-demand careers. Amazon pre-pays tuition, even when it means people leave the company. Over 300,000 employees globally have participated in Career Choice since 2012. The $1 billion commitment means Amazon plans to upskill another 500,000 employees globally.
As part of this transformation, Career Choice will be refocused around the qualifications and career pathways that are most in demand in all 14 countries where it operates. This will ensure the programme evolves in step with the changing economy and focuses on areas of job growth: cybersecurity, software development, logistics, renewable energy, and mechatronics. Courses are designed to offer flexibility around varying work schedules, through partnerships with more than 90 educational institutions across Europe.
At Amazon's Tilbury fulfilment centre in Essex, UK, Anvesh Ejapa joined as an associate packing items for customers. Through Career Choice, he completed a pre-apprenticeship course in mechatronics engineering, funded by Amazon, while he continued working shifts. He's now a mechatronics apprentice, learning to install, maintain, and repair the robotics systems that power the operation.
Career Choice sits within Amazon's Future Ready 2030 commitment, a $2.5 billion global pledge to help 50 million people build skills for the future of work. In 2026 alone, Amazon is investing more than €30 million in Career Choice across Europe.
"We couldn't find enough skilled people for the roles we need, so we made a decision: we're going to develop them ourselves," said John Boumphrey, Amazon UK Country Manager. "That's what this $1 billion commitment to Career Choice is about, preparing hundreds of thousands of employees for the careers of the future."
Preparing the workforce for the future
Today's announcements reflect Amazon's belief that investing in people means both preparing the workforce for the future and making sure no one is left behind.
Career Choice and Supported Internships sit alongside a wider set of Amazon programmes: more than 6,000 apprenticeships created since 2013, with apprentices working in robotics, engineering and data science; AWS training programmes preparing learners for AI careers; and many programmes reaching students in classrooms across the continent.
For more information, visit the Career Choice page.
