ASML

A US company claims it can build a cutting-edge lithography machine. ASML says not even remotely

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Substrate is not just another startup. It was founded in 2022 by brothers James and Oliver Proud, and is backed by Peter Thiel (he co-founded PayPal and is one of the largest investors in Silicon Valley). Despite having existed for only four years, it has raised more than 100 million dollars and has been valued at more than 1 billion. This very successful start-up is based on a promise: the Proud brothers claim that they can build photolithography equipment as advanced as the most sophisticated they have. the Dutch company ASML. Currently this firm from the Netherlands is the only one capable of manufacturing the machines extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) that are used to produce cutting-edge semiconductors, which has placed it in an effective monopoly position in the global semiconductor industry. In the current scenario of confrontation with China, the US is interested in having a national company capable of manufacturing cutting-edge lithography equipment. This is Substrate’s trump card. However, we have reasonable grounds for reluctantly taking up the promise of the Proud brothers. “No one is coming for us” Christophe Fouquet, the general director of ASML, assures that no company on the planet is in a position to compete with them. During a conversation with Connie Loizos, an editor at TechCrunch, Fouquet has argued that “the challenges of lithography are many. Being able to make an image is a starting point, but that image must be produced in large quantities, at very low cost, at high speed and with nanometric precision.” It makes sense. “We had to solve only one problem: obtaining extreme ultraviolet light. And that alone took us 20 years” “I always say that the only reason ASML was able to build an EUV machine is because 80% of it already existed from prior knowledge and products developed over time. We had to solve just one problem: getting the extreme ultraviolet light. And that alone took us 20 years. When starting from scratch, the challenge is enormous. I have heard many statements. And I have seen some images. But we got our first image with EUV technology 30 years ago, and even then we need 20 more years of hard work to turn it into a manufacturing system,” points out the head of ASML. It is clear that Christophe Fouquet trusts his technology. And in your product. However, the starting point of Substrate is different from that of ASML. This American startup uses a particle accelerator as a light source for an X-ray lithography tool instead of using extreme ultraviolet light like ASML. According to the Proud brothers Their technology allows them to manufacture a silicon wafer at an order of magnitude lower cost than with ASML’s EUV approach. Be that as it may, there is another fundamental difference between the ASML and Substrate strategies. And instead of supplying machines to chip manufacturers, as ASML does, Substrate wants to establish its own network of semiconductor production plants equipped with its photolithography machines. Furthermore, its plan is very ambitious: it aims to produce cutting-edge integrated circuits on a large scale in 2028. It sounds daring, no doubt, but time, as always, will put everything in its place. Image | ASML More information | TechCrunch In Xataka | TSMC has made the chip industry’s most intriguing decision: not to use ASML’s most advanced machines

Manufacturing 60 machines a year may not seem like much. In practice, those of the European ASML are setting the pace of AI

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Sixty machines a year sounds like a lot when we talk about artificial intelligence. We are used to huge numbers: data centers, billions of dollars and increasingly ambitious models. But AI also depends on things that are much more physical and difficult to scale. And that’s where ASMLa European company that manufactures lithography equipment to produce advanced chips, becomes a difficult piece to avoid. This year it will manufacture at least 60 machines. And they will be indispensable. To get an idea of ​​scale, artificial intelligence does not rely solely on better models. Just a few days ago, Reuters pointed out that Microsoft, Meta, Amazon and Alphabet plan to allocate more than $600 billion in capital spending in 2026 to expand their AI infrastructure. These players need semiconductor manufacturers, who need advanced technology to produce the chips that will equip their customers’ future data centers. Here ASML appears in all its dimension. The Dutch company does not manufacture the chips that will end up in data centers, but it does manufacture the machines that allow the most advanced ones to be produced at scale. For now, because China is accelerating this raceis the only global supplier of this equipment, known as extreme ultraviolet lithography machines. This position explains why a company based in Veldhoven has become such a relevant piece for a career that is usually viewed from Silicon Valley or Taiwan, but that also has a decisive role in Europe. The European manufacturer that sets the pace for AI The striking thing is that the great jump translates into a very specific figure. The data comes to us from the last presentation of the firm’s financial results, specifically those of the first fiscal quarter of 2026. Roger Dassen, VP and CFO of ASML, pointed out that they plan to manufacture at least 60 standard EUV machines in 2026. That is 36% more than those sold in 2025. In other words: in an industry that is measured in gigantic investments, significantly increasing production means moving to dozens of machines, not hundreds or thousands. By 2027, the firm hopes to reach at least 80 units. TWINSCAN EXE:5000 Manufacturing more units is not as simple as expanding an assembly line. ASML’s most advanced lithography equipment has a size comparable to that of a medium bus and they are among the most complex devices ever created. They are huge systems, extremely precise and assembled for months in clean roomswith purified air to avoid any contamination. The reason is simple: in this process, a single dust particle can disrupt production. That’s why scaling doesn’t just depend on having more orders on the table. There is a part of this history that remains outside the ASML factories, but that weighs almost as much as its own production. Their customers also need to build clean rooms to install the machines they purchase, a task that requires specialized labor, electrical connections, technical expertise and abundant available power. It is a basic condition for these dozens of pieces of equipment to later translate into more real manufacturing capacity. In other words: the machine matters, but the place prepared to receive it and put it to work also matters. Then there’s everything that happens before one of those systems leaves the Dutch company. Their equipment is built with components from more than 5,000 suppliersso increasing the pace requires that entire network to move forward at once. If one of those links does not arrive, the whole may suffer. And talent adds another difficulty: in the south of the Netherlands, many technical profiles are already in the company or in your supply chain. That’s why Veldhoven’s signature searches for candidates at Dutch and foreign universitieswithout weakening the partners you need to grow. That is the reverse of a figure that, in isolation, may seem small. Sixty machines don’t sound like much in an industry that talks about gigantic models, data centers and huge budgets. But what we have seen is that each of these units is part of a physical, technical and human chain that is much more difficult to accelerate than it seems. This boom is precisely what has helped consolidate ASML as the European company with the highest stock market valueahead of names like LVMH either Hermes. AI is also at play here on the Old Continent. Images | ASML (1, 2) In Xataka | ASML has the most in-demand and advanced lithography machines in the world. And now also, his Lego set

The chip industry has its own Lego black market. ASML created it by accident

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Rick Lenssen works as a data analyst at the Dutch company ASML and builds Lego models on the weekends. It could have remained there, a mere hobby shared with his children if the company that employs him did not design and manufacture the lithography machines necessary to produce microchips, one of the key elements of current technology and one of the key suppliers of TSMC, Samsung or Intel. Now, his Lego designs imitating the original machines reach four-digit figures on eBay. 380 million in 851 pieces. It appeared in the ASML online store at the end of November 2024: a Lego model called TWINSCAN EXE:5000, measured 35 centimeters long and cost $227.95. It reproduced the high numerical aperture extreme ultraviolet (High-NA EUV) lithography machine that the company delivered to Intel in late 2023 and that allows chips to be printed from its 2 nanometer node. The actual equipment weighs 165 tons, has more than 100,000 parts and had to be transported in three Boeing 747s. The Lego set reproduced it in the style of the popular toy brand, it included a purple ray that represented ultraviolet light and a minifigure with the full clean room suit that technicians wear. The product sheet, perhaps anticipating what was to come, already warned that multiple orders from the same customer would be cancelled. Brick Lenssen. This is the nickname given to Rick Lenssen, a 39-year-old company employee who became interested in Legos. by chanceafter taking his children to a toy fair in the Netherlands. His first personal project was an exact replica of the ASML campus in Veldhoven: two years of work, 2,500 euros out of his pocket and 25,000 pieces, with details as obsessive as the peregrine falcon that nests on a roof of the complex, accompanied by a pigeon that, according to him, acts as food. He designed everything first on the computer and assembled it in the attic of his house. Where do I put this. Lenssen then encountered a drama that will be familiar to any Lego fan: what to do once you finish building the set. He offered it to the campus itself, but they didn’t want it. Lenssen wrote to ASML’s CEO on a Friday night, and within hours he wrote back saying he loved the set. To get the model out of the attic, it had to be dismantled piece by piece (like the real ASML machines), and company workers loaded it into a van. Today it is the first thing visitors see when they arrive at the company’s reception. It’s official. The jump to merchandising officer arrived later, with a model of the skyline of the campus in charge of promoting an internal app, and then the two models of machines. He was not the first: Jeroen Ottens, an ASML engineer who had worked at Lego, I had modeled a previous version. The cheapest model in the current range, the TWINSCAN NXE:3400C, at $166.70, was not born as a commercial product either: it started as internal training tool before becoming a special edition open to the public. It took Lenssen a few weeks to design the current two sets, one with a 61-page instruction manual. Your only compensation is a copy of each model. Employees only. The sales policy is one unit per person and verified ASML email is mandatory. For weeks, some fans managed to place orders bypassing that restriction due to a security hole in networks, and measures had to be taken: in December 2024 ASML began canceling orders from buyers without an actual corporate email. The EXE:5000 file even disappeared and can only be consulted today through the Wayback Machine. The same corporate email restriction covers the rest of the merchandising of the company, yes, much less coveted: sweaters, mugs, pins and Christmas decorations. eBay fever. Of course, speculation was not long in coming, as It usually happens with Lego sets that disappear from the market. Individual sets of those designed by Lenssen have been seen for $600, while the complete collection reaches $4,500. Before closing that section of the store, ASML sold 1,355 units of the latest model (there are 44,000 company employees, possibly not all of them interested in building with toy blocks). Although the comparison is absurd, only six of the real machine have been sold. In Xataka | The great fear of the US is that ASML’s UVP machines will continue to arrive in China. So he is going to intensify his trade war

has found a way to block the technological development of ASML

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China seems to be very clear what should you do to emerge victorious from the dispute it is having with the US in the crucial semiconductor scenario. Without 100% Chinese advanced chips its military capacity, the development of its models of artificial intelligence (AI) and the competitiveness of its technology companies will suffer in the medium term. At this juncture you need to develop your own teams of extreme ultraviolet photolithography (UVE), which are the appropriate machines to manufacture cutting-edge integrated circuits, as soon as possible. But getting them ready is not easy at all. Engineers from some Chinese companies, such as Huawei, SMIC or SMEE, and researchers from various scientific institutions, such as Tsinghua University or the Chinese Academy of Sciences, are combining reverse engineering techniques applied to computer equipment. deep ultraviolet photolithography (UVP) of ASML that has in its possession and innovations devised by themselves. It is the logical path. However, that are using reverse engineering It does not imply that we should conclude that they only know how to “copy.” China’s innovation capacity is, objectively, beyond doubt. China is filing critical patents to protect itself and weaken ASML So far this March, Huawei, SMEE and Tsinghua University, among other Chinese entities, have registered an unusually high volume of patents linked to the development of photolithography equipment. What China intends is, above all, to protect its intellectual property. But the nature of some of his latest patents reflects that he also pursues block ASML and some of its essential suppliers, such as ZEISS or TRUMPF. And it is doing so by registering patents directly linked to the next generation of photolithography equipment, so it is taking ownership of the path that ASML will have to travel in the future. Several of these critical patents describe fundamental innovations about SSMB-UVE technology. Several of these critical patents have been registered by Tsinghua University and describe fundamental innovations about technology SSMB-UVE (Steady-State Micro-Bunching-UVE), which we can translate as Microclustering in steady state for the generation of UVE radiation. This technology seeks to generate this radiation that is so important for produce advanced chips using a synchrotronwhich is nothing more than a circular particle accelerator that is used to analyze the properties of matter at the atomic level. One of the patents registered by this Chinese research center describes how electrons can be organized in a particle accelerator to ensure that they emit coherent light with a wavelength of 13.5 nm. If over the next decade the semiconductor industry decides that laser vaporization of tin droplets, which is the technique ASML is usinghas reached its thermal limit and accelerators represent the only way to reach the 1,000 watts of power necessary to implement Hyper-NA technologyChina will have the upper hand. However, this is not just about particle accelerators. Huawei and SiCarrier have registered several patents dedicated to UVE radiation interference lithography already LDP type ultraviolet light sources (laser induced discharge). One of these critical patents describes an innovation that uses interferometry to generate nanometer-resolution patterns. without depending on the very complex ZEISS lenses. If at some point technological development takes ASML, ZEISS or any other Western company down this path they will have to pay the Chinese entities, negotiate an exchange of intellectual properties or develop your own alternative innovations. And doing so is not easy. Image | Generated by Xataka with Gemini In Xataka | TSMC acknowledges that it has considered taking its factories out of Taiwan. It’s impossible for a good reason. In Xataka | The looming bottleneck in AI is neither RAM nor gas: it’s that TSMC’s N3 node is absolutely saturated

China claims that having its own ASML is not that difficult. At the end of the day “ASML is a simple integrator”

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China is advancing at a fearsome speed, but they are their own critics. A group of scientists and industry representatives has published an analysis very critical in which they describe their semiconductor industry as “small, dispersed and weak.” For these experts, the problem is that they do not have their own ASML, so they propose creating one, and the curious thing about it is precisely that: that they do not see it as difficult to do. Not authors, authorities. Among the authors of the study are Wang Yangyuan —co-founder of SMIC— or Chen Nanxiang —director of the YMTC NAND chip manufacturer—. Both they and the rest of the participants are recognized personalities in the field of semiconductors. That makes it clear that this articlepublished in the magazine Science and Technology Review China is valuable to understand the state of this industry. The US veto works. This article indicates that the United States has managed to contain China’s advance in three areas: electronic design automation (EDA) used in chip design, the manufacture of silicon wafers, and the creation of chip manufacturing equipment, especially those with extreme ultraviolet (UVE) photolithographic technologya segment that is absolutely dominated by the Dutch ASML and that China has not yet managed to match despite its efforts. There are many companies, but they are too small. The study analyzes in depth the situation of the Chinese semiconductor market, which they describe as small, dispersed and weak. And to prove it they give a significant fact: there are 3,626 domestic chip design companies in China, but “the total value of the industry’s output was 646 billion yuan (approximately 91 billion dollars). In other words: the total sales of these 3,626 companies were less than the sales of NVIDIA alone.” Smartphone chips are doing well. Of course, these experts point out that several Chinese companies have managed to reach “the world’s leading edge” in terms of chips for smartphones. They mention HiSilicon Semiconductor and Unisoc, which occupy the first and second place among the largest smartphone chip designers in China, with market shares of 20 and 10% respectively. And the “mature” chips, too. Something similar happens with chips with much more mature technologies, such as those manufactured with 28 nm photolithography or higher. That problem is already solved in China, which does not have to depend so much on foreign manufacturers. In fact, China now represents 33% of global production in this segment, and design and manufacturing processes are not limited by internal restrictions. Too dependent. Despite its many advances, China remains the world’s largest importer of integrated circuits. It invested $385.79 billion in 2024 in these components, even exceeding its oil imports ($324.7 billion). Here China has a big problem of dependence on chips from third-party foreign manufacturers, and this is especially noticeable in automotive chips (95% of them import) and memory chips (90%): all of them depend on imports. There is a clear bottleneck in high-end integrated circuit production. In search of Chinese ASML. The document also addresses competition with ASML but not as a direct commercial rivalry, but as a strategic challenge of technological sovereignty. The Dutch company is described as “a simple integrator” that coordinates more than 5,000 suppliers to manage the 10,000 components of an EUV machine. The suggestion of the study is precisely to create a Chinese ASML that unifies the advances made by different companies. But. Although progress has been made In this ambitious objective of creating SVU machines, “integrating them with a national effort is a problem that must be resolved during the 15th five-year plan” that concludes in 2030. To do this, these experts assure, there must be financial support and human personnel is required. We already knew that China I was trying to copy ASMLbut for now it is going badly. The document talks about developments such as promising Flip-FET technology (FFET) of Peking University. This advance allows us to reach 3-2 nm nodes without depending exclusively on EUV machines, but it remains to be seen if this method ends up being successful or not. In Xataka | Holland has just declared war on China in the most important battle of the century: control of semiconductors

Everyone wants to take away ASML’s throne. Today ASML has decided that the throne is higher

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A team of researchers from ASML They claim to have discovered a way to increase the power of the light source used in their chip production machines. According to their conclusions, this technology would allow chip production to increase by 50% in 2030. Good news for ASML, very bad for its rivals in China and the US. 1,000 watts. Michael Purvis, the ASML engineer who led the research, explained in Reuters that “It’s not a parlor trick or anything like that. We demonstrated for a very short time that it can work. It’s a system that can produce 1000 watts with the same requirements that you might see on a customer.” An almost miraculous process. In its UVE machines ASML needs to create an extremely energetic ultraviolet light. They use a wavelength of only 13.5 nanometers, but to achieve this light the process is exquisitely complex: Microdroplets of molten tin the size of a fraction of a human hair are launched through a vacuum chamber These drops fall one after the other, more than 100,000 times per second A giant carbon dioxide laser shoots at each droplet The impact turns the tin into a very hot gas (plasma) that even exceeds the temperature of the sun. Plasma emits EUV radiation Ultra-precision mirrors manufactured by Zeiss collect that light and direct it toward the chip And it is with that light that the circuits are “drawn” on the silicon wafer with atomic precision Tech drops. What they achieve with the new system is to double the frequency of the tin drops, going to 100,000 per second, which allows more light to be generated. They also use two previous laser pulses instead of one: the first shapes the drop and prepares it. The second converts it into plasma more efficiently. More chips than ever. Currently, the machines UVE photolithography (Extreme UltraViolet) from ASML work with a power of 600 watts. This achievement would allow a 50% increase in the yield or percentage of functional chips obtained from a wafer. It is crucial to turning ASML’s chip production systems into true precision machines. wafers to me. Teun van Gogh, responsible for ASML’s NXE line of EUV machines, indicated in Reuters that the company’s intention is to make it possible for them to use this technology in a much more affordable way. If everything goes as expected, machines that take advantage of this technology will be able to process 330 silicon wafers every hour, instead of the current 220 wafers. The US tries to compete. In the United States, at least two startups, Substrate and xLight, have managed to raise hundreds of millions of dollars to develop machines that compete with those of ASML. Substrate is working in an x-ray based projectwhile xLight —led by Pat Gelsinger and with investment from the US Government— wants to use particle accelerators. And China, of course, too. China takes years trying to create machines like ASML, but so far it doesn’t seem to be succeeding. There is now talk that China has its “Manhattan Project” in this area and it seems to be closer to get your own machine with UVE technology. ASML was already leading. Now it does it even more. In both cases, the reality is clear: today ASML still has no competition. It is the master of the world in this segment, and if you want to manufacture the most advanced chips on the market, you need its machines. This new advance promises to further open the gap with its competitors, who do not have machines that can compete with ASML’s current ones… and who will have even more difficulty having those that can compete with this new advance. The future. Purvis added that this new technique could be improved in the future: “we see a reasonably clear path to 1,500 watts, and there is no fundamental reason why we cannot reach 2,000 watts.” If true, ASML could hold the key to continuing to lead this market for even longer… if rivals fail to turn the tables. And it seems complicated that they do it. Image | ASML In Xataka | Global tension cannot withstand ASML. He is going to build a huge campus equivalent to 50 football fields

ASML CEO knows the whole world depends on her

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The European Union has announced the inauguration of a new research center dedicated to the development and manufacturing of semiconductors. The project, called NanoIC, wants to become one of the fundamental pillars of the European Chips Act program. 2.5 billion euros on the table. The total budget is 2.5 billion euros, of which 700 million come from EU funds. Another 700 million will come from regional and national governments, and the rest will put ASML on the table and other industrial partners. What is Imec. In reality the project is an expansion of the Imec facilities at its headquarters in Leuven, near Brussels. This body does not manufacture commercial chips, but is the “laboratory” in which rival companies such as Intel, Samsung or TSMC collaborate to define the chips of the future. clean rooms. This is a new clean room (“cleanroom“) of 2,000 square meters which will among other things house ASML’s new next-generation High NA EUV scanner which is expected to arrive in mid-March. The total area of ​​Imec’s clean rooms amounts to 12,000 square meters and the company claims that this makes it a central part of the Chips Act strategy. Imec will soon build another 4,000 square meter clean room on the aforementioned Leuven campus. Everyone loves ASML. ASML CEO Christophe Fouquet highlighted the leading role that your company has managed to achieve thanks to its semiconductor manufacturing machines, the only ones in the world capable of producing the most advanced chips today. As he said, these are the machines “that everyone would like to have.” China sighs (for now). He is right: today the US is a key trade ally but does not have comparable technology of its own, and China has been trying to develop extreme ultraviolet machines for some time. but for now he is still behind in that race. Obviously Europe depends on the US and China in many other areas, but ASML is certainly a clear technological asset for European interests. Inverse dependency. The vice president of the European Commission, Henna Virkkunen, indicated in a interview with Politico that “it is true that we have some of the key technologies, such as ASML, that everyone is dependent on globally.” He explained, of course, that the EU has no plans to turn that into a weapon for potential negotiations, “but it is important to realize that we have those strengths that others do not have.” Changing the story. These statements undoubtedly seek to counteract the idea that Europe depends totally on American technology, demonstrating that the old continent also has its own levers to negotiate. Digital sovereignty. The EU is expected to prepare a second Chips Act which should be presented at the end of March and which would clearly differ from the first. Instead of an emergency response to a project that will turn Europe into a competitive region at a technological level. But. The initiative is striking, but it also has important challenges. We are looking at a research center and that means that its size and budget cannot be compared with those investments in data centers made by large US technology companies. But in addition to that parameter there is another even more relevant one: that of talent. Europe must train and attract enough engineers to operate these centers and develop that work there and not in companies or centers that compete in other regions, including of course the US and China. In Xataka | We already know what the chips that will arrive until 2039 will be like. The machine that will allow them to be manufactured is close

‘Ikea ​​hack’ older ASML machines

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When the United States intensified the trade war with China wearing Huawei as a scapegoattriggered a fierce technological advance by the Asian giant. After the veto of Huawei Bans came to the Chinese semiconductor industry, and one hurt more than the others. ASMLleading European manufacturer in advanced machine manufacturing of deep ultraviolet lithography (or UVP), could not sell its best equipment to Chinese companies. Those of extreme ultraviolet or UVE, specifically. These machines are what the different chip manufacturers use to create their products and the industry depends on them. Think of these SVU machines as a gigantic 3D printer: Silicon wafers are their raw material and on them they “print” the circuits necessary for the processors to work. What’s special about ASML machines is that they are able to print those patterns with a precision impossible for any other machine. With the American veto, and with ASML being the only company with the exclusive technology to create this “printing” process, China had a difficult time advancing not only in its consumer chip industry, but in the rampant race of artificial intelligence. However, Chinese companies They are making progress by tricking the machines of ASML that they had obtained before the blockade. With Huawei and SMIC at the helm, they are pushing the machine and achieving the unthinkable with old equipment. The ‘Ikea ​​hack’ of ASML lithography machines One of the concepts that I like the most in interior decoration is the ‘Ikea ​​hack’. It consists of buying a generic Ikea piece of furniture and transform it into one with more personality and even different functions. It is maximizing the potential of a simple and known structure. A 3D printer, but in a brutal way They are doing something similar from SMIC. A couple of years ago it was a company whose name came to the fore almost daily. No wonder: It is the spearhead of the Chinese semiconductor industry and the one that provoked the wrath of US regulators when they realized that they had not finished off Huawei after the veto. Somehow, SMIC had been able to make 7nm and even 5nm chipsa lithograph outside the reach of the machines that China had. He Huawei Mate 60 Pro Kirin 9000S marked the rebirth of the company’s mobile phonesand the surprising thing is that SMIC I had created it with old machines such as the Twinscan NXT:2000i or the Twinscan NXT:1980i. They were UVP machines acquired before the veto. And, although ASML could not sell new material or make updates that improved the base features of those machines, they could provide support. The issue is that these machines were not designed to create integrated circuits as cutting-edge as those manufactured by TSMC, Samsung or Intel, but the ‘Ikea ​​hack’ by SMIC and Huawei to have 7nm chips is the ‘multi-patterning’ technique. In simple terms, this technique involves having the UVP machine make multiple passes at a single point on the silicon wafer to create denser chips. What an EUV machine would do in a jiffyit takes more time and passes to a UVP because the lenses and lasers that “print” the circuits are less precise. “Chinese factories have made impressive progress without full access to the best equipment that others in the sector, such as TSMC or Samsung, have” – Dan Kim, director of strategy at TechInsights As we read in Financial Timesthe TecnInsights analysis group estimates that SMIC has been perfecting the multi-patterning technique beyond the 7 nm process during these years and that Huawei’s Kirin 9030 processor It is the most advanced created by China to date. The achievement is that: they have done it with obsolete machines. Now, despite the trick of SMIC and Huawei, the process has its problems. To start, the obvious: More passes means more manufacturing time than what it would take a more advanced or SVU machine. But also something more serious: the ‘yield’. This concept applies to the percentage of functional chips obtained from a wafer. They are, in short, forcing the machine. And that translates into more time per chip, more probability of a chip being defective and, in total, higher production costs. China’s ‘Manhattan Project’ Now, and as they point out in the Financial Times, although China does not have extreme ultraviolet photolithography machines, they do have some of the latest, most advanced machines from the previous generation of UVP: the 2050i and 2100i. Were sent by ASML before the veto September 2024 will come into effect, and the United States Bureau of Industry and Security he has a fly behind his ear. A silicon wafer One of the arguments to veto the sale of ASML equipment to China is national security. These advanced chips are introduced in consumer technology, but also in military technology. And, according to the FT, the US administration has been investigating what kind of support ASML has provided to Chinese customers, even considering the possibility of tightening maintenance standards for machines that manufacturers already had. In any case, China continues to push this technology. and in Reuters they go further: a group of former ASML engineers who now work in Chinese companies have managed to decipher the secrets of the Dutch company’s most advanced machines through reverse engineering. As if it were the Chinese version of the Manhattan Project With which the United States built its atomic bomb in World War II, Chinese engineers would have used ASML machine parts available in “alternative” markets to develop more advanced technology than what they officially had at their disposal. ASML CEO stated that China would need “many, many years” to develop that technology, but if they have already managed to decipher the secrets of the SVU machines with reverse engineering, the movie changes completely. There are other difficulties, since the lenses used in UVE machines are Extremely accurate and proprietary from Zeisswhich cannot officially sell to Chinese manufacturers either. According to Reuters, the prototype created by these engineers is capable of generating light in the … Read more

and has already achieved what only ASML had, according to Reuters

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Let’s continue with historical analogies. Ptolemy Vking of Egypt from 204 to 181 BC. C. —not to be confused with the astronomer, Claudius Ptolemy—, he was very delighted with the great Library of Alexandria. The legendary site brought together human knowledge of the time in hundreds of thousands of papyrus rolls. However, the king was restless: the Pergamon Library (in modern-day Türkiye) did not stop growing. They wanted to get on his back, so he took drastic measures. He prohibited the export of papyrus. The story sounds familiar to you, right? As if he were a modern Trump who wanted to stop innovation by vetoing the export of new technologies, Ptolemy V promised them very happily. “Let’s see how they manage now in Pergamon,” he surely thought. And then Pergamum did what China has also ended up doing: he looked for the chestnuts. Given the scarcity of papyrus, in Pergamon they were forced to perfect a technique that already existed in a rudimentary form: using animal skins to treat, stretch and polish them with the aim of writing on them. They called that new support charta pergamena (Pergamon paper), but its popular name is another much better known one: Parchment. The story, told in the fabulous essay ‘Infinity in a reed‘, by Irene Vallejo, is more than 2,000 years old, but as we see it is a faithful reflection of what is happening now in the United States trade war with China. Specifically, with photolithographic technology, which the US has tried by all means to prevent from reaching China. So China is inventing its own scroll. Been at it for quite some timebut until now it seemed to be totally stuck. At most, rumors tell us, he had managed to create a photolithographic machine with deep ultraviolet (UVP) technology, less advanced than UVE. And not even for those. China’s Manhattan Project The Dutch company ASML has managed to maintain the exclusive of this technology so far. If you wanted to make advanced chips, you needed to buy one of their very complex machines. China had a difficult time facing the US veto, but as has happened in other areas, the Asian giant has not stood by and has tried to find alternatives. And in this case, it seems to have a profile. This is what they indicate in Reuterswhere they indicate that a group of former ASML engineers have managed to decipher the secrets of the company’s EUV machines through reverse engineering. The prototype created by these engineers is already capable of generating light in the extreme ultraviolet range, but has not yet produced functional chipssay the sources cited in said medium. It is expected, however, that this machine will be used to build advanced chips starting in 2028, although some analysts are more conservative and believe that chips will not be manufactured in it until 2030. According to this report, to build said prototype, use was made of parts that were available from ASML machines in alternative markets. Sources consulted by Reuters described this development as the Chinese version of “the Manhattan Project” which led the United States to build the atomic bomb in World War II. The achievement challenges claims made by ASML CEO Christophe Fouquet in April. He then assured that China would need “many, many years” to develop such technology. However, the discovery of this prototype suggests that this period will be significantly reduced. There are of course important obstacles to overcome. One of them is access to high-precision optical systems, and here is another Western company with control of these elements: Zeiss. This project is so crucial to China’s interests that it is being carried out with great secrecy. A Chinese engineer with many years of experience at ASML was signed with a generous bonus, and when he started working He did it with an identification card with a false name. He soon realized that the team members, other former ASML engineers of Chinese nationality, also had fake names. At least two current ASML employees in the Netherlands with Chinese nationality have been contacted by Huawei recruiters since 2020. European laws limit ASML’s ability to know where its former employees have gone to work, but the company has already had disagreements over this issue. In fact, in 2019 they won a case in which a Chinese engineer was sentenced to pay 845 million dollars for stealing trade secrets. The defendant declared bankruptcy but continues operating in Beijing with the support of the Chinese government, according to court documents cited in Reuters. It is now appropriate to return to the lesson taught by the history of Ptolemy V. This king’s boycott had an effect opposite to what he desired. It did not stop Pergamum, it created a superior material – parchment was much more resistant – and it saved literature: many classic works managed to reach us thanks to having been written on parchment and not on papyrus, which would have fallen apart. Now, of course, it remains to be seen if China is indeed the Pergamon of this story. He has the strengths to achieve it, of course. In Xataka | Global tension cannot withstand ASML. He is going to build a huge campus equivalent to 50 football fields

ASML and TSMC are masters of semiconductors. A US startup believes it knows how to end them: with X-rays

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A mysterious American startup called Substrate has made its appearance with a purpose extraordinarily ambitious: compete head to head with ASML. The Dutch company has become the master of the segment of advanced photolithography machines for chip manufacturing, but at Substrate they believe they have the key to turn the tables. Why is it important. ASML has no competition in the market since it placed its first equipment of UVE photolithography. The ASML thing is a monopoly de facto: If a chip manufacturer or designer wants to access to produce the most advanced models, it depends entirely on the Dutch company. No one has managed to stop it since then, and even China, which is trying to free itself from that dependence, it’s really complicated. Substrate. This is the name of this startup that has developed a new team in which use particle acceleration to manage lithography. This technology allows microscopic circuits to be etched onto silicon wafers, and this new company claims that its machines could be in manufacturing plants in the US within the next two years. It all sounds very good. Maybe too much, but they already have funds to try: they have just raised 100 million dollars and among investors There is Peter Thielco-founder of PayPal and current CEO of Palantir. And already, they will try to help create the new TSMC. The challenge is enormous: ASML has invested decades and billions of dollars to perfect its photolithographic equipment, and the complexity of this market makes it very difficult for companies created from scratch to compete. Substrate’s objective is twofold, because it also aims to ensure that its machines enable the affordable chip manufacturing in the US. Or what is the same: it not only wants to compete directly with ASML, but also allow American manufacturers to compete with TSMC on American soil. There it is nothing. Light is everything. When creating those circuits, some of the lines created are so fine that their dimensions are even thinner than the wavelength of light. To solve that ASML problem they do use of extreme ultraviolet light (EUV) through a very complex set of lenses and mirrors. These machines generate a type of artificial light that is capable of engraving those very fine lines on advanced chips. Very special X-rays. In Substrate they propose a different idea. Although they do not give all the details to prevent someone from copying them, their machines use X-ray lithography (LRX). A particle accelerator creates a light source from x-rays with a shorter wavelength, allowing the beam to be used to create advanced chips. Current Substrate machines are currently capable of working with 12 nanometer nodes, comparable to ASML High NA EUV machines: That would put them on par with the most advanced chip production lines in the world. LRX technology is not new. This technique has existed since the 1970s, but had been abandoned because longer wave techniques (UVP and UVE) continued to scale without the need to overcome the great technical challenges of RXL. In substrate they seem to have precisely the solution to those problems, which focused on optics and the need to use massive particle accelerators as a light source. And they promise brutal cost savings. At Substrate they maintain that their LRX equipment will have an estimated cost of about 40 million dollars, compared to 400 million for ASML’s High-NA EUV. In addition, there would be another associated revolution: the possibility of carrying out the so-called single exposure patterning at advanced resolutions (2 nm, 1 nm and beyond), thus eliminating the additional costs of the multipatterning (multiple exposures). If that promise is fulfilled, the production cost of advanced wafers would be 50% lower according to Substrate. But. Of course, it’s one thing to say it and another to do it. The precision of the process, they explain in Semianalysisis a monumental obstacle. The transfer of patterns (going “from light to silicon” almost “carving it”) remains problematic, and among the challenges is solving the roughness of the edges of the printed patterns, which is amplified during engraving. There is also the problem of stochastic noise (shot noise, random fluctuations in photons that cause defects) and secondary electron blurring inherent to the high energy of X-rays, which fundamentally limits resolution. There are also currently problems with the 1.6 nm overlay, which is still high for more advanced processes where 1.0 or 1.2 nm are sought. In Xataka | AMD is today a semiconductor giant. In its beginnings it was something much more humble: a blatant copy of Intel

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