Amazon announced on Wednesday that it is closing its Amazon Fresh in Singapore and discontinuing its local fulfillment operations. The grocery service, along with partnerships with Little Farms and AS Watson, will end on July 6. A “small number” of jobs in Singapore will be affected by the decision, although the company has not disclosed the exact number.
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Affected employees will be offered internal transfers where available, as well as compensation and career transition services where they are not.
Peter Li, country manager for Amazon in Singapore, said the changes are a result of demand patterns: customers in Singapore mainly prefer products from Amazon stores in the US, Japan and Germany, rather than local stock.
Amazon employs about 2,500 people in Singapore across businesses including retail, global selling, entertainment, devices and AWS, none of which are affected by the closure. The company described its commitment to Singapore as “deep,” despite the closure of a flagship product.
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Singapore was never an obvious choice for the Amazon Fresh model. The country is small, densely populated and already served by local grocery chains such as FairPrice , RedMart and Sheng Siong , as well as various last-mile delivery services. Amazon entered the grocery space in 2017 through Prime Now, which was later rebranded as Amazon Fresh, and has formed local partnerships, including a deal with AS Watson ’s Cold Storage and a partnership with Little Farms for organic and specialty produce.
The competitive landscape has made it difficult for Amazon Fresh to succeed. Closing the service allows Amazon to redirect investment toward cross-border shipping of products that customers can’t easily buy from local retailers. This strategy aligns with the company’s actions elsewhere, such as shutting down its Try Before You Buy clothing service globally in 2023 and suspending its physical Amazon Go and Amazon Fresh stores in the U.S., focusing instead on Whole Foods.
The decision to close Amazon Fresh in Singapore reflects a broader trend of downsizing operations where Amazon lacks scale or diversification. The cuts in Singapore are small but come during a year of significant corporate restructuring, including 16,000 layoffs in January, the largest in the company's history.
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AWS remains a strategic priority for Amazon, with a commitment of S$12 billion (about US$9 billion) to expand its cloud infrastructure in Singapore by 2024. AWS Asia Pacific headquarters opened on IOI Central Boulevard last year, and the company's Global Selling business continues to support Singapore exporters in listing on Amazon's overseas stores.
