January 20, 2022
Will enable chip production in processes smaller than 2 nm. Will be ready during 2024. Intel plans serial production during 2025. The price of each machine is higher than 300 million euros
Intel has ordered from the Dutch ASML the first system in the world for the production of chips using advanced EUV lithography, model TWINSCAN EXE: 5200. As part of the chip minimization process the industry is required to use lithography systems with very short wavelengths to illuminate the production masks through which the chips are built, layer by layer. With the transition to advanced processes (10 nm and below), chip makers have switched from using DUV-Deep Ultra Violet radiation-based systems to EUV-Extreme Ultra Violet radiation-based systems.
But today even EUV systems are not accurate enough. ASML’s new technology has been dubbed High-NA EUV. It makes it possible to produce chips with a junction width of less than 2 nanometers and is expected to reach initial testing stages during 2023. As early as July 2021, Intel CEO Pete Glasinger made the company the world’s first customer of High-NA EUV systems. According to the joint announcement of Intel and ASML, the goal is to complete the development and tests to reach serial production in 2025 using the new machines. It is estimated that a serial production plant needs about 7-8 lithography machines.
“Demand is higher than production capacity”
The Dutch company ASML is almost a monopoly in the field of lithography systems for chip production, and serves as the only supplier of lithography systems for advanced chips, which it supplies to companies such as Intel, Samsung and TSMC in Taiwan. This is reflected in its sales, which totaled about 18.6 billion euros in 2021, compared to about 14 billion euros in 2020. In 2021, the company invested about 2.5 billion euros in research and development. “The demand for new production systems is greater than our production capacity,” said the company’s president and CEO, Peter Vanick, yesterday (Wednesday), following the publication of the reports earlier this week.
He estimated that sales in 2022 will grow by about 25%. They include revenues of € 7.8 billion that will come from the delivery of EUV systems. It is worth noting that the company is currently building TWINSCAN EXE: 5000 systems that will be provided to customers starting in 2023. Intel has ordered such systems as early as 2018. They are also used to develop the next generation system commissioned by Intel (EXE: 5200) which is expected to be launched in 2024. This is a machine that will define new norms in the level of accuracy, chip dimensions and output of the production line. We estimate that the price of each such machine is expected to be significantly higher than 300 million euros. “
Posted in categories: News, Semiconductors
Posted in tags: ASML, Intel, EUV lithography
