Uber lays off 10% of support staff, ends remote work, and blames AI for the first time

Uber has cut 10% of the roles inside its customer service operations, and for the first time the company is putting artificial intelligence at the centre of the explanation. The reductions hit the community operations team and were announced internally on Wednesday, with an Uber spokesperson telling Bloomberg the company is working to simplify operations, strengthen in-person collaboration and continue to embrace AI. Remote employees on that team have also been told to relocate to a hub office, in line with Uber's return-to-office mandate.The memo that landed with the cuts was blunt about why. "Our organization has become too complex and siloed," Megha Yethatika, Uber's vice president of global community operations, wrote to her division. The department has made progress on AI, she said, but unlocking that potential needs the right structure underneath it.