Chipmaker TSMC to have access to advanced chipmaking tool in 2024

In 2024, TSMC plans to utilize an advanced chipmaking tool to drive innovation, providing access to high- developed by Netherlands-based ASML. This tool uses focused light beams to create microscopic circuits on chips, crucial for various digital devices. This move highlights TSMC’s competitive strategy against Intel, as Intel had previously aimed to be the first to adopt this technology in 2025. Initially, TSMC intends to use the tool for research purposes in 2024 before integrating it into mass-production processes at a later date.

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC), a leading chip manufacturer, has announced that, come 2024, it will have access to an advanced chipmaking tool ‘to fuel innovation’. The tool – called high-NA EUV and developed by Netherlands-based ASML Holding – is designed to produce beams of focused light that create the microscopic circuit on chips used in a wide range of devices and machines, from phones and laptops to AI devices and cars. (ASML is the world’s largest producer of chipmaking tools and the only one to have developed extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography systems.)
Why is this important? TSMC acquiring the advanced tool is part of the competition game with Intel, which had announced it would be the first to acquire high-NA EUV and would start using it in 2025. TSMC’s intention for 2024 is to use the tool mostly for research; it remains to be seen when it will become part of mass-production processes.