↓Skip to main content
  1. News/

Layoffs at ASML, get started with meshcore, and more | Community update February 2026

Bright, playful collage with various items related to tech and work.
Table of Contents

Spotlight: Layoffs at ASML #

On 28 January managers at semiconductor producer ASML, based in Veldhoven (Noord-Brabant, NL), announced that they’re going fire around 1,700 workers. ASML managers chose mass layoffs, even though they admit that business is going well. Really well. What’s going on here?

Companies use layoffs as a short-term cost-cutting tool, often to placate shareholders. Instead of distributing increased profits back to the workers who actually created that wealth, workers are given the sack.

ASML is just the latest big company in the Netherlands to pull this trick. Meta and Booking did the same last year.

Are you fed up with doing all the work, and then being treated as disposable? Get organized with other tech workers!

Join Techwerkers today.

Upcoming events #

Want to hang out with other tech workers? Join one of the upcoming events:

Also coming up: an open conversation on AI in the workplace, new knowledge sharing sessions, and more. Keep an eye on Techwerkers events for the latest info.

New resources #

What to do when the internet goes down, AI impact in the workplace, and more fresh resources for tech workers:

What if the internet goes down? Introduction to LoRa mesh network communication with Meshcore #

Outages, centralization, and repression are growing risks to worker organizing. In this live session and accompanying article, tech workers Mar, Liam, and Marissa discuss how workers can stay connected even when the internet goes down, using LoRa mesh network communication with Meshcore software.

Watch the talk or read the article.

AI is hurting you at work (but it doesn’t have to) #

Companies use AI as a blanket excuse to underpay workers, erode worker protections, and conduct mass layoffs. But you as workers have the power to shape a different reality.

Read the article.

How to get started with LoRa mesh network communication (Heltec T114 + Meshcore) #

Want to send messages over long distances without the internet or mobile networks? In this beginner-friendly tutorial, tech worker Kit shows you how to get started with mesh network communication using a LoRa board and Meshcore.

Watch the tutorial.

Let’s build a MeshCore companion and use LoRa (Livestream!) #

Curious about off-grid messaging and mesh network communication? Join live as tech worker Ben follows along with a beginner-friendly tutorial to set up a LoRa board using Meshcore.

Watch the livestream playback.

On the radar #

Here’s what’s been on Techwerkers’ radar recently:

  • Dutch court rules that the supervisory board of the FNV labour union can push through undemocratic reforms against the wishes of union’s worker-members; a severe infringement on the democratic process at the FNV. The part of this supervisory board that made the decision, is affiliated with the right wing of the Dutch Labour Party (PvdA). Now that the top board of the FNV is only accountable to a zionist supervisory board, rather than the FNV’s members, it has also immediately capitulated and acquiesced to CIDI in order to silence those who speak up for Palestine at FNV-events.
  • Trade unions are concerned about the sale of the Limburg petrochemical firm Sabic to a German investment company, want clarity about long-term consequences for workers.
  • Tech giant Microsoft tricked regulators and may now go ahead in building a huge data centre in Amsterdam, likely resulting into huge negative impact on the environment and energy costs for working people.
  • Having too few people to do too much work results in workplace stress, a report from FNV union finds.
  • The team at Reversing.works, which exposes worker surveillance, is looking for beta testers of their tools.

Want to get more involved? Join Techwerkers.