Amazon Issues Message To Engineers Saying The Company Doesn't Support Third-Party AI Development Tools

Amazon has asked all its software engineers to halt using third-party coding tools and pivot exclusively to Kiro, its proprietary development, in order to minimise the gap with rivals like Google and OpenAI. According to an internal memo, reviewed by Reuters, the directive will have a strong impact on the individuals who use other products in the company, including OpenAI Codex, Cursor, and Anthropic's Claude Code.The directive was posted on the internal news site of Amazon, signed by the senior Amazon Web Services and e-commerce executives Peter DeSantis and Dave Treadwell, respectively. The directive said, 'While we continue to support existing tools in use today, we do not plan to support additional third-party, AI development tools.'This

step by Samsung has been taken to fight the perceptions against the tech giant that it is trailing behind its competition in the AI race. Reuters mentioned that the company has previously designated OpenAI's Codex as 'Do Not Use' in October after a six-month internal assessment. Furthermore, Claude Code has also received the same status of Do No Use by Amazon. Also Read: Tech Layoffs 2025: Amazon Removed Around 14,000 Employees This Year Including 40 Percent EngineersThe memo says that the adoption by Employees will serve as a major contributor for the success of Kiro. The executives said, 'As part of our builder community, you all play a critical role in shaping these products, and we use your feedback to aggressively improve them. To make these experiences truly exceptional, we need your help.'

A Little About Kiro

Amazon rolled out Kiro (preview mode) in July and then made it available to the general public last week. For the record, more than 250,000 developers have used the tool in its first three months, and the model handled around 300 million requests. Kiro works on generating formal specifications, task lists, and design documents along while focusing on the maintainability issues.