I'm not aware of what you're referring to. The most recent series of layoffs at Amazon was due to poor sales of the Fire Phone [1][2]. Most companies in Amazon's position would have done the same thing.
I don't believe that's a thing that happens at Amazon. I've worked here nearly 4 years, across several product launches (hardware and software) and only known of one person being let go, and that was for entirely unrelated reasons (politics and such).
