ASML Holding NV will ship its latest chipmaking machine to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) 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.
Photo: REUTERS
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.
TSMC has raised concerns about the machine’s price tag. “I like the high-NA EUV’s capability, but I don’t like the sticker price,” TSMC Senior Vice President Kevin Zhang (張曉強) said in Amsterdam last month. TSMC’s so-called A16 node technology, which is due in late 2026, won’t need to use ASML’s high-NA EUV machines and can continue to rely on TSMC’s older EUV equipment, he said.
Still, TSMC has been an active participant in ASML’s high-NA EUV project. Jefferies analysts including Janardan Menon said they expect TSMC to use high-NA at the A14 node in 2028.
ASML remains of the view that revenue next year is likely to be in the upper half of the guidance range, the analysts said after the call with Dassen.
Jefferies analysts said it is likely that ASML’s average orders will be around 5.7 billion euros in the remaining three quarters of this year, pushing sales next year to 40 billion euros.
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