Belgium’s ASML and Imec open lab to test newest chipmaking tool

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) -ASML, the biggest maker of equipment used to make semiconductors, said on Monday it has opened a testing laboratory for its High NA EUV lithography equipment, together with Belgian chip research firm Imec.

The laboratory in Veldhoven, the Netherlands, under construction for years, will give major chipmakers and other companies supplying equipment and materials an early opportunity to work with the 350 million euro ($380 million) tool, the first of its kind. gender.

ASML dominates the market for lithography equipment, a central step in the chip manufacturing process in which beams of light are used to create chip circuits.

Among chipmakers, only TSMC, Samsung, Intel and memory specialists SK Hynix and Samsung are capable of manufacturing using ASML’s current generation of extreme ultraviolet or EUV machines.

The new High NA tool enables up to 60% better resolution and is expected to lead to new generations of smaller, faster chips.

ASML repeated on Monday that it expects customers to begin commercial manufacturing of the tool in 2025-2026.

To date, ASML has shipped just one other test machine, to Intel in the United States, which plans to use the tool in its 14A process in 2025.

ASML has orders for more than a dozen, although TSMC, its biggest customer for EUV equipment, has said it does not need to use High NA tooling for its A16 chips, which are expected to enter production in 2025.

($1 = 0.9223 euros)

(Reporting by Toby Sterling; Editing by Kirsten Donovan)