Amazon is opening a new fulfillment center in Italy, as well as a new sortation center. Both will be operational by the fall in time for the holiday shopping season.
“Amazon is further increasing the size of its Italian logistic network to meet increasing customer demand, expand its product selection and support a growing number of independent small businesses selling at Amazon using Fulfillment by Amazon warehousing and delivery,” the company announced.
The new fulfillment center will be located in Agognate, a hamlet of Novara municipality in Piedmont region, and will create up to 900 jobs within three years of launch of the site. The new sortation center will open in Spilamberto.
As well as touting job growth in its announcement, Amazon emphasized the environmental-friendly aspects of the sites, including efforts to boost biodiversity of flora and fauna.
In addition, Amazon addressed worker safety, and it called out new procedures put in place due to the pandemic. “In Italy alone have been purchased in 2020 more than 230 million units of hand disinfectant, 12 million pairs of gloves, 9 million units of face-masks, face shields and other mouth-nose-covers, and 35 million units of disinfectant wipes,” it wrote in this week’s announcement.
It included the following section touting its investments in Italy:
Amazon Investments in Italy
Amazon has invested over 5.8 billion euro in Italy, generating over 8500 full-time jobs since its arrival in 2010. 1,600 new permanent jobs has been created in 202, in more than 40 locations across Italy.
During 2020, the Company opened two new top-of-the-line fulfillment centers: in Castelguglielmo/San Bellino (Rovigo) and in Colleferro (Rome), while over the last two years, Amazon has opened various centers and warehouses for sorting packages throughout the Peninsula. This, along with two additional urban fulfillment centers to serve Amazon Prime Now customers in Milano and Rome.
On top of these investments in its Italian logistics network, in 2013, Amazon opened its Customer Service center in Cagliari, alongside its Milanese corporate headquarters as well. In 2017, Amazon moved to its new corporate offices (17,500 square meters) in the emerging business district of Porta Nuova. The Company also opened a Development Center for research on speech recognition and natural language understanding to support the Alexa voice recognition technology.
Above and beyond full-time employment opportunities that Amazon continues to bring with it, the Company also provides support to entrepreneurs and business people looking to open an online store, either by taking an existing business online, or those desiring to expand their business. The Company offers various options available on its platform: from Marketplace for direct sales to customers, to utilizing the Amazon Logistics network for stocking and delivery of items through its FBA program (Fulfillment by Amazon). Italian companies selling merchandise through the Amazon.it portal have generated over 25,000 jobs, surpassing already in 2019, €500 million in exports.
Read the full announcement on the AboutAmazon.eu website.
