ASML to ship its US$380 million tool to TSMC this year
Two of ASML’s biggest customers, TSMC and Intel Corp, will get the so-called high-NA extreme ultraviolet (EUV) machine by the end of this year, ASML chief financial officer Roger Dassen told analysts in a recent call, according to the company spokesperson.
Intel has already placed orders for the latest high-NA EUV machine and got the first one shipped to a factory in Oregon in December last year. It wasn’t clear when TSMC, the biggest EUV customer of ASML, would receive the equipment. A representative for the Taiwanese chipmaker said it works closely with its suppliers and declined to comment further.
ASML’s new machine can imprint semiconductors with lines that are just 8 nanometers thick — 1.7-times smaller than the previous generation — and will be used for producing chips that will power artificial intelligence applications and advanced consumer electronics.
The machines cost 350 million euros (US$380 million) apiece and weigh as much as two Airbus SE A320s. ASML is the world’s only manufacturer of the EUV lithography technology and demand for its product is a litmus test for the sector’s trajectory.
