ASML has just shipped its second-ever High-NA EUV lithography machine to a mystery new customer, with the first chip-making tool — worth $370 million, by the way — received by Intel not too long ago now.
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The Dutch company shipped its newest High-NA EUV lithography machine to Intel earlier this year, but it wouldn’t announce who its second customer was. It’s expected to be a company like TSMC, NVIDIA, Apple, or even Samsung.
Intel will use ASML’s new Twinscan EXE:500 High-NA EUV lithography machine in early production sometime between 2026 and 2027, to make its next-gen Intel 14A-based processors. ASML is the largest company in the Netherlands, with the Dutch government recently enacting “Operation Beethoven” to keep ASML from branching out overseas, and keeping its most valuable asset in the Netherlands by improving infrastructure, schooling, housing, and more around the Eindhoven region where ASML is based.
The High-NA EUV lithography machine in question is ASML’s bleeding-edge Twinscan EXE:5000, which was transported from The Netherlands to Portland, Oregon, USA in a cargo plane. A truck then picked it up and delivered the $380 million machine, which will require 250 ASML and Intel engineers — and around 6 months — to install the machine completely. The system required 250 crates to transport the machine, weighing around 330,000 pounds.
The second customer receiving ASML’s new High-NA EUV lithography machine will have the same shipping requirements, as this machine is gigantic.