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Japan on edge of EUV lithography chip-making revolution

asiatimes.com

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Re: Japan on edge of EUV lithography chip-making revolution

#51

Post by [deleted] »

adrian_b wrote: post #49
alephnerd wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair point! That said, 10% reduction in power is decent along with the reduction in mirrors, but it would still take some effort for an attempt like this to be cost competitive compared to licensing from ASML.

As another poster has already said, the power is reduced 10 times, not by 10%. At such a power reduction, it should be possible to use a much smaller and cheaper EUV source, allowing the use of multiple lithography systems, or increase a lot the throughput achievable with the current EUV sources. I hope that they have modeled correctly the losses in the mirrors. Here the incidence angle of the EUV light on the mirror…

[deleted]

Re: Japan on edge of EUV lithography chip-making revolution

#52

Post by [deleted] »

mlyle wrote: post #32
alephnerd wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair point! That said, 10% reduction in power is decent along with the reduction in mirrors, but it would still take some effort for an attempt like this to be cost competitive compared to licensing from ASML.

90% reduction in power.

[deleted]

Re: Japan on edge of EUV lithography chip-making revolution

#53

Post by ineedaj0b »

coliveira wrote: post #36
mensetmanusman wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ASML having competition is good for everyone. Seems tariffs are a win/win/win

I haven't seen any success on the Trump/Biden tariffs. They only managed to weaken US companies by cutting access to Asian markets. China is doing just fine.

tariffs/sanctions are meant to be long term, 15-30 years before showing effectiveness. they are meant to not stop progress but stop 'compounding' progress. if they show effectiveness sooner even better! but effects are better seen after 10 years.

if A has $500 and B has $500 (and each put money away at the end of the year), tariffs on A are meant to 'eliminate' the compounding interest of the market. so over long horizons B ends up ahead. A still makes progress (but substantially further behind from where it could have been).

my example is more true of sanctions than tariffs. i've noticed many misguided tariffs from countries with less noble aims recently.

Re: Japan on edge of EUV lithography chip-making revolution

#54

Post by alephnerd »

adrian_b wrote: post #49
alephnerd wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair point! That said, 10% reduction in power is decent along with the reduction in mirrors, but it would still take some effort for an attempt like this to be cost competitive compared to licensing from ASML.

As another poster has already said, the power is reduced 10 times, not by 10%. At such a power reduction, it should be possible to use a much smaller and cheaper EUV source, allowing the use of multiple lithography systems, or increase a lot the throughput achievable with the current EUV sources. I hope that they have modeled correctly the losses in the mirrors. Here the incidence angle of the EUV light on the mirror…

> Unfortunately this paper might be a hoax

Not necessarily. It might just have performed at this peak capacity in ideal lab conditions.

This would need to be reproduced, but like you pointed out ASML and Zeiss most likely tested this configuration out at some point in the last 25 years.

That said, the English is very off on this paper - I did a re-read and it looks like they're proposing that they were able to cut the power down to 20W from 200W

Re: Japan on edge of EUV lithography chip-making revolution

#55

Post by ineedaj0b »

roenxi wrote: post #24
legacynl wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Democracies are notoriously fickle, are they really though? At least in democracies things require oversight, debates and people are being held responsible. It's exactly authoritarian regimes that can turn on a dime, if the supreme leader feels like it.

> At least in democracies things require oversight, debates and people are being held responsible. I'm scratching my head at this one. Why do you think they are doing those things if not because they are constantly re-evaluating their direction? If you're just going to keep doing the same thing over and over again there isn't much need for debate. The oversight and accountability mechanisms are all-weather good ideas…

obama and trump are more similar than people realize is the blackpill. 'median voter theorem' and such

Re: Japan on edge of EUV lithography chip-making revolution

#56

Post by alephnerd »

adrian_b wrote: post #15
mangecoeur wrote: post #5

They mention validation in software which suggests a hardware implementation is a way off with a lot of practical issues that might crop up on the way. So best of luck to them but i wouldn’t expect to see hit the market for quite a while - saying they are “on the edge of euv chip making” is very optimistic.

By far the easiest path for this technology to be used in practice would be to license it to ASML. The older and cheaper models of the ASML EUV sources would be good enough for this system that needs a much smaller power for the EUV sources. The European partners of ASML are the only companies that could manufacture at this time the optical system. Nevertheless, it is likely that the patent owners would prefer to lic…

> It seems very unlikely that ASML would be willing to sell EUV sources separately to Nikon

Nikon's out of the EUVL game and doesn't plan on returning. They're reiterated this in just about every quarterly prospectus for years now.

They're migrating to licensing whatever EUVL IP they had to other players.

They've pivoted heavily to FPD Lithography (LCD, OLED, and potentially PV fabrication) - better margins, less political headache.

Re: Japan on edge of EUV lithography chip-making revolution

#57

Post by osnium123 »

l5870uoo9y wrote: post #34
coliveira wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you consider that China is unable to get ASML equipment, they have strong incentive to improve on this technology immediately. If Chinese companies start this path, then the issue is not if ASML will have improved, but if they will be able to withstand the competition.

Regardless of the immediate ban on ASML, China has made a geopolitical and strategic decision to obtain advanced chip manufacturing capabilities be it in 5, 10 or 20 years. Would be timely if Western politicians showed same concern for national manufacturing capabilities instead of continuously relying on outsourcing.

Western countries lack the talented and hardworking manufacturing workforce necessary to stay competitive.

Re: Japan on edge of EUV lithography chip-making revolution

#58

Post by [deleted] »

alephnerd wrote: post #54
adrian_b wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As another poster has already said, the power is reduced 10 times, not by 10%. At such a power reduction, it should be possible to use a much smaller and cheaper EUV source, allowing the use of multiple lithography systems, or increase a lot the throughput achievable with the current EUV sources. I hope that they have modeled correctly the losses in the mirrors. Here the incidence angle of the EUV light on the mirror…

> Unfortunately this paper might be a hoax Not necessarily. It might just have performed at this peak capacity in ideal lab conditions. This would need to be reproduced, but like you pointed out ASML and Zeiss most likely tested this configuration out at some point in the last 25 years. That said, the English is very off on this paper - I did a re-read and it looks like they're proposing that they were able to cut th…

[deleted]

Re: Japan on edge of EUV lithography chip-making revolution

#59

Post by snowpid »

l5870uoo9y wrote: post #34
coliveira wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you consider that China is unable to get ASML equipment, they have strong incentive to improve on this technology immediately. If Chinese companies start this path, then the issue is not if ASML will have improved, but if they will be able to withstand the competition.

Regardless of the immediate ban on ASML, China has made a geopolitical and strategic decision to obtain advanced chip manufacturing capabilities be it in 5, 10 or 20 years. Would be timely if Western politicians showed same concern for national manufacturing capabilities instead of continuously relying on outsourcing.

You mean , like Asml , Zeiss and Jenoptics aren't national manufacturing capabilities? Or ist just your head national = American, western = American and not German , Dutch, European not Western?

Re: Japan on edge of EUV lithography chip-making revolution

#60

Post by DarkSucker »

codewiz wrote: post #20

"This was made possible by carefully rethinking the aberration correction theory of optics." Can someone explain how they carefully rethought the theory to reduce the number of mirrors from more than 6 to just 2 (or 4)?

The new design design uses on axis mirrors to image the photomask onto the wafer, and on axis mirror systems are far easier to design and fabricate compared to zig zag (off axis) systems. I've never designed an EUV system, and I guess that Shintake's team had to solve some materials or optical coating technology issues that allowed them to consider the simpler on axis design. Having worked on zig zag and on axis designs in the IR and VIS range, I can say that Shintake's design will be much (orders of magnitude?) easier to align and assemble.
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