This video gives insight into a Dutch company ASLM that makes the machines that make the newest chips and the associated Geo-political maneuvering to restrict access that technology.
The company is ASML. They are, by a wide margin, the world’s leading supplier of optical lithography tools, which are probably the most critical element of the extremely complex process that is integrated circuit manufacturing.
And they’re in a tough spot. Their largest customers are Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (TSMC), Samsung, and Intel, probably in approximately that order. Those three companies also own significant shares of ASML, which they purchased in part to fund development of – and guarantee themselves access to – the newest, shiniest, most leading edge technology. So remaining on the good side of, respectively, the Taiwanese, South Korean, and US governments is extremely important.
And now the United States has essentially declared the entire (mainland) Chinese semiconductor industry to be an arm of the Chinese military, and declared that US “persons” – either citizens or companies – can’t do business with it.
ASML is not a US person. They’re Dutch. But, as I said, Intel is one of their most important customers. And they have a major development facility in the US. And they have a lot of US citizens as employees.
So yeah, they’re in a tough spot.
(Incidentally, after ASML, probably the two most important integrated circuit manufacturing equipment suppliers in the world are Applied Materials and Tokyo Electron, based respectively in the United States and Japan. They’re in the same situation, more or less.)
1 Like