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throwup238today at 11:18 AM2 repliesview on HN

EUV was developed in a joint venture with the Department of Energy and ASML, Intel, etc called EUV Corp. It’s why the US can export control it.


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culitoday at 6:58 PM

Also Japan has a monopoly on essential EUV materials like photoresists and mask blanks and pellicles. Japan is also the only country in the world that can produce a number of highly specialized ancillary machinery like the actinic light systems used to inspect EUV photomasks. ASML also acquired its e-beam inspection tech from a Taiwanese company. There's also no way ASML could run anything at production if it wasn't for TSMC and Samsung.

Not to mention the critical role of the US in its development. The core EUV light source was invented in San Diego!

Farfignoggentoday at 11:44 AM

LOL, no Mention of IMEC(Interuniversity Microelectronics Centre) in the EUV development process and the only reason that the US can restrict the ASML EUV equipment is the EUV Light source and mirror optics for that is partially US produced and the IP there falls under US IP/Export restrictions!

From ASML:

"ASML’s extreme ultraviolet (EUV) light source was developed and is manufactured at its facility in San Diego, California. Acquired from the US firm Cymer in 2013, the R&D team here developed the laser-produced plasma (LPP) system that fires lasers at tin droplets 50,000 times per second to generate EUV light."

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