Ride- and food-hailing app Uber Technologies (UBER) – Get Report has hired Amazon.com (AMZN) – Get Report executive Sukumar Rathnam as its new chief technology officer, filling a position that has been vacant for more than three months.
Rathnam, who had been at Amazon since 2011 and was most recently a vice president in charge of product selection and catalog systems, will start Sept. 28. Announced within Uber’s ranks on Thursday, the hiring was first reported by The Information.
Uber’s previous chief technology officer, Thuan Pham, stepped down in May after seven years at the San Francisco company just before it laid off more than 6,000 employees, or 25% of its workforce, as it grappled with a global, pandemic-related slowdown in ride demand.
Those layoffs continued this week, with the transportation and food-delivery giant announcing on Wednesday that it will slash 30% of its jobs in the U.K.
Rathnam joins Uber’s C-suite at a tumultuous time for the ride-sharing company, which has suffered massively at the hands of the coronavirus pandemic and plunge in demand not only for ride-sharing but in the need for people to move from “A” to “B.”
Even with gains in its Uber Eats delivery business, the company still posted a wider-than-expected second-quarter loss of $1.02 a share on sales of $2.2 billion, down almost 30% from the comparable year-earlier quarter.
Analysts polled by FactSet currently expect Uber to post a third-quarter loss of 60 cents a share on revenue of $3.2 billion.
Shares of Uber were down 0.19% at $36.99 in trading on Friday.