a giant in charge of world-class production

The supply chain is long when it comes to creating wafers and chips. From silicon sand suppliers, to sand filters, without forgetting the companies that make the masks and, of course, the ones that make the molds.

These are the ones that need to be praised and criticized when something goes wrong, when there is a delay, but but to make a chip there is an incredible amount of products in the background, the fact is that the most popular industry relies heavily on one provider to keep them alive.

ASML: How to make a company a great chip

"If the world moves on, we may be left behind." As straightforward as it is humble and at the same time extreme, it's the fact that it is currently in line with all the world's top manufacturers and the supergiant that could end the industry with a pen.

ASML is currently the largest automotive recording equipment company in the world. Even Intel doesn't hide it and it has fallen into its technology. The company is based in the Netherlands and specializes in Veldhoven sets the speed of the most advanced cutting edge technology at the time: EUV.

If next year we have an Intel or AMD CPU with an EUV, we should assume that ASML is the architect of such work in our homes, and as such, RAM, SSD and any other product that requires a special working chip.

Everything we've talked about here at HardZone about EUV technology is because ASML. At present it is one of the best-rated companies, not only in Europe, but globally, as it is a historic one for the entire industry.

It has more than 13,000 employees, 30 office buildings, 102 international workers, a competitive salary, 40 days holiday leave, offers its employees stock buyouts, a pension plan, group insurance, travel subsidies and reimbursement for travel expenses. . All of this is within the Netherlands.

That without having all the help to include your new employees and the job opportunities they offer. They are so big and fast developing that their Japanese competitors cannot run the race and ASML currently has over 80% of the world market.

History of world lithography

The story of the giant is less well-known and that we not only provide lithography equipment, but also have a portfolio of advanced products such as metrology and surveying systems, computational lithography, software control and the EUV and DUV system.

They started in 1980 at a low cost and in a very modest way, something we have already seen in other big companies, except that in this case they don't start from scratch. It was Philips and ASMI founding the so-called ASM Lithography (ASML), which after four years of operation was introduced, PAS2000 step which was a success.

Investments started to come in large numbers from its large parent companies and in 1985 they had 100 employees. 1986 introducing PAS2500 step, which has had some basic improvements: it acquired alignment technology, which was later incorporated by Carl Zeiss's lens after the contract.

But it was not all happiness, in 1988 ASMI withdrew due to financial problems and Philips was not able to contribute enough to keep up the pace of R&D. But that small amount of money into ASML went well, and in 1990 the company went public and later introduced 5500 PAS, the turning point for a European company.

The program attracted the attention of key customers, allowing huge amounts of cash to come in and with it, it all started working again. The IPO brought about the IPO, Philips sold half of its shares in 1995 and the rest in the years that followed, when economic strengthening enabled ASML to grow.

Removal of existing chips in AMD and Intel comes with TWINSCAN

After years of study and R&D, in 2001 ASML launched the program TWINSCAN With the transformation of its double platform, this meant that its machines could expose one entry to the next measurement and alignment, increasing performance, productivity and true accuracy.

The TWINSCAN AT: 1150i in 2003 as well TWINSCAN XT: 1700iof which the first was the first clean-up immersion system in the world and the second was the first submerged volume production system in the world.

Already in 2007 TWINSCAN XT: 1900i with a 193 nm pure immersion system, where both Intel and GlobalFoundries were able to create chips from the water layer between the lens and the wafer. Soon, in 2010, there was a change NXE: 3100 the first EUV machine and that has been the basis of what we have today.

In 2013 ASML recognized Cymer, a manufacturer of lithography light sources, and as a result accelerated the EUV development process. Before the end of the year he arrived NXE: 3300 by the second generation EUV system and two years later NXE: 3350 being the third generation.

Few units per year, are very expensive and very expensive

It should be noted that the deployment of these machines is in the pipeline due to the complexity of each design. Manufacturers pay a terrible price for themselves and strive to acquire this technology to control the chip market. For this reason, ASML introduced in 2016 the first EUV system to produce high-quality, high-quality products NXE: 3400, which understood the changes of TSMC and Intel, and Samsung joined the car.

Approaching today, ASML introduced its most advanced systems NXE: 3400B and NXE: 3400C, but in the meantime they have acquired companies such as Hermes Microvision (HMI) and Maper, where it is expected that between this year and the next e-beam technology used for wafer recording.

As we can see, it's the story of a giant with a semiconductor world in doubt, its development is highly anticipated and will explain the future of Intel and AMD or NVIDIA chips. This approach has come to a head with companies already found, and it doesn't look like everyone is going to cover much of Europe's ASML.