Japan on edge of EUV lithography chip-making revolution

https://asiatimes.com/2024/08/japan-on-edge-of-euv-lithography-chip-making-revolution/

by ksec • 2 years ago

183 97 2 years ago

roenxi4• 2 years ago

Will this attempt work out commercially? Maybe, maybe not. But more interesting here is the strategic situation beyond the currently understood tech.

The US has made it clear that it sees semiconductors as a vector to attack power centres in Asia. Today it is China. Democracies are notoriously fickle, tomorrow it could be India, Japan, Korea or anyone really. There is a strategic need here to break the remaining European monopolies on equipment supply. For China the need is urgent but for all the Asian powers the need is real.

Given the manufacturing powerhouse that the collective Asia represents, I expect they'll figure all these details out and become technologically independent at least on paper. They've had more than a century of experience in dealing with the west, the risks of the status quo are too obvious once the US is overtly exploiting it.

corimaith• 2 years ago

The US has made it clear that it sees semiconductors as a vector to attack power centres in Asia. Today it is China. Democracies are notoriously fickle, tomorrow it could be India, Japan, Korea or anyone really.

Sorry but this sounds more like propaganda. China also sees supply chains "as a vector to attack power centres in Asia", that's applicable to anyone and anywhere. I'm not sure why Asia is a singled out here, sounds like one to trying to construe a racist motive when there is none.

The aformentioned India, Japan & Korea aren't worried about USA, their primary concerns are China and their neighbours. China's explicit objective to control the entire supply chain places them at a direct conflict of interest with those countries. They've already tried sanctioning Korea and Japan over petty issues like Fukushima water waste. Trying to appeal to some vague "Asian" solidarity as opposed to the existing OECD and actual shared norms sounds more like an attempt to divide allies rather than actually caring about those countries' interests.

lmz• 2 years ago

They've already tried sanctioning Korea and Japan over petty issues like Fukushima water waste.

Well China wasn't the only one with concerns, but probably the only one with the balls to sanction: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/21/world/asia/korea-japan-fu... - and why shouldn't they?

roenxi4• 2 years ago

I'm not sure why Asia is a singled out here, sounds like one to trying to construe a racist motive when there is none.

How long has Asia been a race? The continent contains 60% of all humans.

legacynl2• 2 years ago

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.

roenxi4• 2 years ago

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, but typically the US is using them to constantly adjust and change policy responses.

Compare that to somewhere more authoritarian where they can't change policies precisely because those 3 aspects are quite weak. They find their groove once and stick to it for decades, and anyone trying to shake things up gets mired in institutional inertia. Sure a supreme leader could force sudden change in theory, but why are they going to do that? He's got everything set up how he likes it and his view of the world fossilised maybe 10, 20 years ago.

Democracies are absolute monsters. The moment they detect that their interests have changed they'll vote out the old mob, bring in a new one and do things differently. The US went Obama to Trump in one election cycle, which was probably a shock for anyone trying to negotiate with them.

coliveira12• 2 years ago

Your description of democracy doesn't match with existing capitalism. In capitalism, what matters is the individual capitalist desire to achieve profits. The economic decisions are made by a few oligarchs on top, not by the population.

hcfman• 2 years ago

Are you really suggesting that we have oversight and people being held responsible? Not in the Netherlands in any case, where did you think this was happening?

zenapollo• 2 years ago

Fickle? It’s been Russia and China for like 100 years. I’m no expert but it might be due to crushing political oppression and aggressive empire building. Japan, S Korea, and Taiwan are all chip manufacturing power houses, and the only one not happy to see China blockaded is China. Though I’m sure they’re working on hacking into and stealing these new designs as we speak.

roenxi4• 2 years ago

It’s been Russia and China for like 100 years.

It hasn't been. The US was one of the key players who built China up to what it is today, for a significant chunk of the past century they were strategic partners against Russia.

And it is worth remembering that post WWII the US was busy marginalising the Europeans, making sure Germany was prosperous but didn't execute an independent military resurgence and helpfully euthanising the British empire. There were enemies other than Russia and China over that period. It just happens that the other European powers were broken to the point where their resistance was ineffectual and the process was mostly amicable - if they'd been more competent it'd have been a lot nastier.

ksec2• 2 years ago

A few points in terms of context.

1. The original paper in Japanese claim to use only 4 mirrors to achieve the same results. Although this story only mentions >the EUV equipment’s optical system is greatly simplified

1. Japan isn't new to lithography. Both Canon and Nikon are in the market as well and eventually gave on EUV research and focuses on DUV.

2. Power consumption is reduced by a factor of ten is extremely important as modern EUV, and future High-NA EUV are insanely power hungry, with 30%+ of the raw cost of chip manufacturing goes to energy usage alone. And this isn't just TSMC but also NAND and DRAM maker as well.

3. ASML has something similar in the work as well. Although not to any extreme as factor of 10. But then they also dont need these sort of claim to get funding as the one here does.

bradleyjg3• 2 years ago

with 30%+ of the raw cost of chip manufacturing goes to energy usage alone

Is the marginal cost of production at all relevant compared to the upfront capital outlay?

ksec2• 2 years ago

One is OpeX and the other is CapeX. I would argue they are both important.

epoxia2• 2 years ago

You can get a loan to spread out payments, reducing operating costs would be similar to reducing those payments. It also impacts viability and resale in second hand markets.

red_trumpet• 2 years ago

Later on the article says

To eliminate this problem, Professor Shintake aligned two axis-symmetric mirrors in a straight line and used a total of only four mirrors instead of ten.

ibaikov• 2 years ago

30%+ of the raw cost of chip manufacturing goes to energy usage

Are there any links to this data? Curious to read more about it, thanks.

mangecoeur• 2 years ago

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.

adrian_b4• 2 years ago

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 license it to Nikon, to create competition for ASML.

Nikon should be able to make the optical system, but this could need a few years of development, unless Nikon already has a secret internal research project for making EUV mirrors.

The most difficult problem remains the EUV source, even if a much simpler source than the current sources is good enough.

It seems very unlikely that ASML would be willing to sell EUV sources separately to Nikon, providing components for competing systems.

The only deal that seems possible would be if ASML accepted to sell some of their older models of EUV sources to Nikon, in exchange for receiving licenses for this new improved kind of EUV optical system, which will then be incorporated in all new EUV systems, regardless if they are made by ASML or Nikon.

This would reduce the dependence on ASML and its partners, but ASML would still completely control the market of EUV sources, even if not also the market of complete lithography systems, like it does now.

alephnerd6• 2 years ago

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.

cherryteastain• 2 years ago

Canon and Nikon are also working on alternatives such as nanoimprint lithography [1]. Chinese universities and companies are working on particle accelerator based EUV sources [2]. Question is, will they be able to actually commercialize it before ASML manages to get improved versions of their current litho machines out the door? Commercialization of a technology like this can easily take 5-10 years, and ASML aren't twiddling their thumbs. Once the incumbent has a technology that is, say, 80-90% as good as the challenger, the big players will always choose them to minimize risks.

[1] https://semiengineering.com/nanoimprint-finds-its-footing-in...

[2] https://www.electronicsweekly.com/news/business/china-to-bui...

alephnerd6• 2 years ago

Question is, will they be able to actually commercialize it before ASML manages to get improved versions of their current litho machines out the door

Canon and Nikon don't need to be bleeding edge. Majority of the chip fabrication market is 20nm, 28nm, and 40nm along with analog chips (60nm+).

The sub-20nm chips will become more common as more and more fabs get turned on and EUV eventually gets commoditized, but the RoI isn't there yet for most electronics aside from high margins consumer electronics like GPUs, high end cellphones, etc.

Chinese universities and companies are working on particle accelerator based EUV sources

Both the Chinese (SMIC) and the Japanese (OIST) attempts don't have great yield rates (the OIST project above is barely 50% of ASML's and SMIC's is reported to be similar).

Both will crack it eventually, but the order book for ASML's High NA EUV (3nm and below) is entirely Intel, Samsung, and the American fabs for TSMC for the next 3-4 years so by the time a competitor is ASML comparable, a significant subset of high end US and SK fabs will have transitioned to 3nm.

Panzer04• 2 years ago

But how much of the monetary value generation derives from small nodes?

Surely the vast majority of fab income derives from these small nodes, just based on the sheer pricing disparity between complex semiconductors and everything else.

EvgeniyZh• 2 years ago

Canon and Nikon have these already, and yet their market share is pretty small

Animats• 2 years ago

It's interesting that the author's picture is with a linear accelerator. It's quite possible to use a linear accelerator to generate EUV to etch chips. It's been done as a test at SLAC.[1] But that approach was more expensive than AMSL's, since it needed a mile-long accelerator.

There was a startup in Fremont, Lyncean Technologies, that had a 10 watt EUV source based on a small synchrotron.[2][3] They supposedly got to 10 watts. But that was too weak for EUV semiconductor work. They struggled for years to find a market, and went bankrupt in 2022. Here's the video of the equipment auction.[4] If, with this new optical system, only 20 watts are needed, that technology is worth reviving.

Something YC might be interested in.

An accelerator source is much cleaner than the laser tin-zapping thing AMSL uses. It's amazing that works as a commercial product.

[1] https://euvlsymposium.lbl.gov/pdf/2014/39af88b9d637418d86614...

[2] https://web.archive.org/web/20220119174924/https://lynceante...

[3] https://www.euvlitho.com/2017/P17.pdf

[4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D5eGyeNgCSY

rramadass• 2 years ago

the laser tin-zapping thing ASML uses.

The Science/Engineering to make this work is nothing short of magic! There are actually two lasers; the first one to reshape the spherical tin droplet to concave shape and the second one to vaporize it to plasma generating EUV range light.

The Extreme Engineering of ASML’s EUV Light Source by Asianometry - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Ge2RcvDlgw

xbmcuser• 2 years ago

If I am not wrong cost is a big factor currently not the tech advantage. It's one of the reasons we got the meme Moore's law is dead. So if someone is able to get even a generation or so older node compared to previous at cheaper price it will be a huge shift in the industry.

coliveira12• 2 years ago

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.

mensetmanusman3• 2 years ago

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

l5870uoo9y• 2 years ago

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.

talldayo5• 2 years ago

Eh, we've got time. When NATO allies stopped selling China engines for their fighter jets, it took China more than 15 years to bootstrap an aerospace industry that could design engines on-par with Russia. There are a lot of things that China has every incentive to invest in, but literally cannot as a result of sanctions.

On top of that - an underappreciated aspect of lithography is yield. It's likely China can already beat ASML in a lab setting with <5% yield rates, but that's not a competitive process. What makes TSMC so valuable is their relatively high yield on cutting-edge node technology, alongside their fairly large capacity to supply multiple businesses at once. China has to design a scalable EUV alternative, bring it up to acceptable/profitable yield and quality control, and then scale it to replace the demand for most of the domestic chip clients. It's a lot of work, and it would not surprise me if we saw a lot of China's chip efforts echo their confident-but-slowed progress in engine design.

alephnerd6• 2 years ago

The actual paper [0]

The yield rate is unimpressive (100 wafers/hr) compared to existing ASML EUV lithography machines (170-200/hr) or even DUV lithography (300/hr).

[0] https://arxiv.org/abs/2405.11717

adrian_b4• 2 years ago

The yield rate by itself is not very relevant.

It also matters which are the energy and materials consumption, the occupied floor area and the acquisition and maintenance prices associated with that yield.

When all those are small enough, it may be worthwhile to replace a big and expensive fast machine with many smaller and cheaper slow machines.

alephnerd6• 2 years ago

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.

coliveira12• 2 years ago

For a new technology, that is not important. Yield rate will improve as more engineering is applied by these companies.

codewiz• 2 years ago

"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)?

DarkSucker• 2 years ago

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.

edgineer• 2 years ago

7nm and smaller

Ugh. The process naming which has nothing to do with size anymore still confuses people.

m3kw9• 2 years ago

Anyone that wants to short ASML out the door on Monday, please reconsider. It will take 10-15 years to make a machine like ASMLs from end to end.

evrimoztamur• 2 years ago

Also consider that this article is from 7 Aug, with Canon in particular showing good post-crisis recovery.

SMAAART• 2 years ago

Ouch! Time to liquidate my ASML position!

jensC• 2 years ago

Maybe it is a good idea to wait and see how the market envolves. I guess ASML has a few more years to be the leader.

graycat• 2 years ago

Recall that early on in such chip making IBM skipped blue, UV, EUV and built a cyclotron to generate X-rays.

phonon• 2 years ago

This has already been debunked.

"As it turns out, however, EUV monopolist ASML and its optics suppliers Zeiss have already considered similar setups. “Zeiss has several designs available with similar/better performance than the Shintake design,” an ASML spokesperson told Bits&Chips. So far, these haven’t generated chipmakers’ interest due to the reduced resolution and smaller field size of the design. Should this change in the future, “we will explore whether one of Zeiss’ systems makes sense.”"

https://bits-chips.nl/article/despite-superior-efficiency-ja...

Japan on edge of EUV lithography chip-making revolution

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