Amazon Opens Claude and Codex Access After Kiro Falls Short

In November Amazon leaders issued an internal memo urging engineers to rely on its homegrown Kiro coding assistant over external options. The memo said the company would not plan to support new third‑party AI tools while continuing to back those already in use. Amazon has invested billions in rivals like Anthropic and OpenAI, yet its own AI coding tool has lagged behind, contributing to recent outages tied to AI‑generated code.

Amazon VP Jim Haughwout announced the expansion of agentic AI tools for employees to help them innovate for customers. An Amazon spokesperson noted that 83 % of engineers primarily use the in‑house Kiro coding tool. Both Claude and Codex will be made available through Amazon Bedrock, the company’s managed service for secure access to frontier AI models.

The shift signals employee pressure overcoming a strict internal policy, highlighting gaps between Amazon’s AI investments and the usability of its proprietary tools. By offering Claude and Codex on Bedrock, Amazon aims to balance security concerns with developer demand while still promoting its own platform. The change may affect productivity metrics and influence future decisions about tool support.