TSMC, Samsung Adopt ASML's $400M AI Chip Machines

TSMC and Samsung, the world's two biggest chipmakers, have committed to using ASML's next-generation High NA extreme ultraviolet lithography machines, the Dutch toolmaker said Tuesday, as demand for AI chips drives the industry toward smaller and more complex designs.

The machines cost around $400 million each, according to CNBC, and print the circuit patterns onto silicon wafers that make a chip a chip.

The two companies join Intel, which ASML said in July is already using High NA tools for advanced chip manufacturing.

The Second Announcement

TSMC and Samsung are also joining ASML in an industry effort to move photomasks — the stencils used to print patterns onto wafers — from today's 6-inch format up to 12 inches. ASML says the bigger masks mean better productivity and lower chipmaking costs.

That matters because High NA tools currently print with a smaller mask, which caps how physically large a chip they can make. ASML's existing EUV tools can print a chip up to about 800 square millimeters, and Nvidia, Google and others design data center chips right up to that limit, Reuters reported.