Behind extremely secured doorways in a large lab within the Netherlands, there is a machine that is reworking how microchips are made. ASML spent almost a decade creating Excessive NA, which stands for prime numerical aperture. With a price ticket of greater than $400 million, it is the world’s most superior and costly chipmaking machine.
CNBC went to the Netherlands for a tour of the lab in April. Earlier than that, Excessive NA had by no means been filmed, even by ASML’s personal group.
Contained in the lab, Excessive NA qualification group lead Assia Haddou gave CNBC an unique, up-close have a look at the Excessive NA machines, which she mentioned are “larger than a double-decker bus.”
The machine is made up of 4 modules, manufactured in Connecticut, California, Germany and the Netherlands, then assembled within the Veldhoven, Netherlands, lab for testing and approval, earlier than being disassembled once more to ship out. Haddou mentioned it takes seven partially loaded Boeing 747s, or a minimum of 25 vehicles, to get one system to a buyer.
The world’s first business set up of Excessive NA occurred at Intel‘s Oregon chip fabrication plant, or fab, in 2024. Solely 5 of the colossal machines have ever been shipped.
They’re now being ramped as much as make thousands and thousands of chips on the manufacturing unit flooring of the few firms that may afford them: Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Samsung and Intel.
Excessive NA is the eco-friendly fuel era of ASML’s Excessive Ultraviolet, or EUV, machines. ASML is the unique maker of EUV, the one lithography units on the planet able to projecting the smallest blueprints that make up essentially the most superior microchips. Chip designs from giants like Nvidia, Apple and AMD cannot be manufactured with out EUV.
ASML instructed CNBC that Excessive NA will ultimately be utilized by all its EUV clients. That features different superior chipmakers like Micron, SK Hynix and Rapidus.
“This firm has that market fully cornered,” mentioned Daniel Newman of The Futurum Group.
Excessive NA chipmaking machine in Veldhoven, Netherlands, on April 24, 2025.
Magdalena Petrova
CNBC requested CEO Christophe Fouquet what’s stopping ASML from setting the worth of its machines even increased. He defined that as machines advance, they make it cheaper to supply the chips themselves.
“Moore’s regulation says that we have to proceed to drive prices down,” Fouquet mentioned. “There’s a perception that in case you drive prices down, you create extra alternative, so we have to be a part of this sport.”
Two main clients have confirmed that Excessive NA has proven massive enhancements over ASML’s earlier EUV machines. At a convention in February, Intel mentioned it had used Excessive NA to make about 30,000 wafers to this point, and that the machine was about twice as dependable as its predecessors. At that very same convention, Samsung mentioned Excessive NA may reduce its cycle time by 60%, which means its chips can full extra operations per second.
‘A really dangerous funding’
Excessive NA can drive chip costs down due to these enhancements in velocity and efficiency. Excessive NA additionally improves yield, which means extra of the chips on every wafer are usable.
That is as a result of it will possibly mission chip designs at the next decision. Excessive NA makes use of the identical course of as EUV machines however with a bigger lens opening that permits for projection of smaller chip design in fewer steps.
“Excessive NA means two issues. At the start, shrink. So there’s extra units on a single wafer,” mentioned Jos Benschop, ASML’s govt vice chairman of expertise. “Secondly, by avoiding a number of patterning, you can also make them quicker and you can also make them with increased yield.”
Benschop joined ASML in 1997, two years after it grew to become a publicly traded firm. Benschop then helped drive the choice to go all in on EUV. The expertise took greater than 20 years to develop.
ASML govt VP of expertise Jos Benschop gave CNBC’s Katie Tarasov a have a look at Excessive NA chipmaking in Veldhoven, Netherlands, on April 24, 2025.
Magdalena Petrova
“We barely made it. I believe generally folks overlook that,” Fouquet mentioned. “It has been a really dangerous funding as a result of after we began, there was no assure the expertise would work.”
By 2018, ASML proved the viability of EUV and main chipmakers began inserting massive orders for the machines. The concept, which appeared not possible to many twenty years in the past, was to create massive quantities of tiny rays of utmost ultraviolet gentle, projecting it by means of masks with more and more small chip designs, onto wafers of silicon handled with photoresist chemical substances.
To create the EUV gentle, ASML shoots molten tin out of a nozzle at 50,000 droplets per second, taking pictures every drop with a strong laser that creates a plasma that is hotter than the solar. These tiny explosions are what emit photons of the EUV gentle, with a wavelength of simply 13.5 nanometers.
Concerning the width of 5 DNA strands, EUV is so small that it is absorbed by all identified substances, so the entire course of has to occur in a vacuum. The EUV gentle bounces off mirrors that purpose it by means of a lens, very like how a digicam works. To unravel for EUV getting absorbed by mirrors, German optics firm Zeiss made particular mirrors only for ASML which can be the flattest artifical surfaces on the planet.
ASML’s older era DUV machines use much less exact rays of deep ultraviolet gentle with a wavelength of 193 nanometers. ASML nonetheless makes the machines — competing in opposition to Nikon and Canon in Japan on DUV — however it’s the solely firm on the planet that is succeeded at EUV lithography.
The Dutch firm started creating the $400 million Excessive NA machines round 2016. Excessive NA machines work the identical as DUV, with the identical EUV gentle supply. However there’s one key distinction.
Excessive NA stands for prime numerical aperture – which means it has a bigger lens opening, growing the angle at which the sunshine is captured by the mirrors. Extra gentle coming in from steeper angles permits Excessive NA machines to switch more and more small designs onto the wafer in a single step. By comparability, decrease NA machines require a number of projections of EUV gentle, by means of a number of masks.
“When the quantity will increase, it will get very complicated process-wise and the yield goes down,” Fouquet mentioned.
Decision improves as NA will increase, bringing down the necessity for a number of masks and exposures, saving money and time. The price of the Excessive NA machine, nevertheless, goes up.
“The larger the mirror you need to use and subsequently the larger the system,” Fouquet mentioned.
These machines additionally take up an enormous quantity of energy.
“If we do not enhance the facility effectivity of our AI chips over time, the coaching of the fashions may devour all the worldwide vitality and that would occur round 2035,” Fouquet mentioned. That is why ASML has decreased the facility wanted per wafer publicity by greater than 60% since 2018, he mentioned.
ASML’s Assia Haddou exhibits CNBC’s Katie Tarasov a Excessive NA chipmaking machine in Veldhoven, Netherlands, on April 24, 2025.
Magdalena Petrova
China, tariffs and U.S. progress
ASML is thought for its groundbreaking EUV machines, however its older DUV machines nonetheless made up 60% of enterprise in 2024. ASML offered 44 EUV machines final yr, with a price ticket beginning at $220 million. DUV machines are far cheaper, starting from $5 million to $90 million, however ASML offered 374 of the legacy machines in 2024.
China is a serious purchaser of these DUV methods, making up 49% of ASML’s business within the second quarter of 2024. Fouquet instructed CNBC this peak in gross sales to China got here due to a “large backlog” in orders that ASML wasn’t capable of fill till final yr. He mentioned enterprise in China needs to be again to the “historic regular” of between 20% and 25% in 2025.
U.S. export controls stop ASML from promoting EUV to China. It is a ban that began beneath the primary Trump administration. Newman of The Futurum Group mentioned it is a “actual lengthy shot” that China may develop its personal EUV machines, as a substitute making units like smartphones utilizing essentially the most superior chips potential with DUV.
U.S. concern over superior tech making its technique to China has accelerated amid the generative synthetic intelligence race. That increase has additionally despatched chip shares hovering, together with ASML’s, which hit an all-time excessive in July.
ASML’s share value has declined greater than 30% since, because the chip trade faces key uncertainties corresponding to President Donald Trump‘s tariffs.
Benschop instructed CNBC that ASML merely would not know the way tariffs will impression the corporate. With about 800 world suppliers, tariff implications for ASML are complicated.
Making a single Excessive NA machine requires many steps of imports and exports. The machine’s 4 modules are made within the U.S., Netherlands and Germany, then they’re shipped to the Netherlands for meeting and testing, the place they’re disassembled once more for cargo to chip fabs in locations just like the U.S. or Asia.
For years, Asia has made up greater than 80% of ASML’s enterprise. The U.S. share sat round 17% in 2024 however is rising quick. ASML has 44,000 workers globally, and eight,500 of them are based mostly within the U.S. throughout 18 places of work.
A lot of ASML’s 2024 Excessive NA shipments went to Intel, which is constructing new fabs in Ohio and Arizona. The U.S.-based chipmaker has struggled lately, however Fouquet mentioned that Intel stays a “formidable associate” for ASML and that it is “very essential” for U.S. semiconductor independence.
Taiwan-based TSMC is way forward of Intel in advancing chip nodes. CNBC recently visited TSMC’s new fab north of Phoenix, which is now in quantity manufacturing. As essentially the most superior chip fab on U.S. soil, the necessity for Excessive NA there’ll possible come quickly.
ASML, in the meantime, is constructing its first U.S. coaching heart in Arizona. Fouquet instructed CNBC it should open within the “subsequent few months” with a objective of coaching 1,200 folks on EUV and DUV every year. It is “a capability that won’t solely meet what is required within the U.S., however will probably be used additionally to coach much more folks worldwide,” he mentioned.
The Dutch firm plans to additional enhance the numerical aperture on its subsequent machine, Hyper NA.
Fouquet instructed CNBC that ASML has some draft optical designs for this subsequent machine, and that, “it isn’t essentially a tough product.” He expects the necessity for Hyper NA to come back “between 2032 and 2035.” He would not speculate on value.
For now, ASML is concentrated on assembly demand for Excessive NA. It plans to ship a minimum of 5 extra methods this yr and ramping to a manufacturing capability of 20 machines in a couple of years.
Watch the video to see Excessive NA in motion.