An ASML cleanroom. [Image: © ASML]
ASML, the giant Netherlands-based maker of sophisticated semiconductor lithography equipment, has announced what it is calling “a new phase” in its partnership with Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e), Netherlands. The company says this academic-industrial collaboration, which will play out over the next 10 years, will include development of a research roadmap, the participation of ASML engineers as faculty, and, eventually, the development of a new on-campus ASML research facility likely to cost several hundred million euros.
Joint program and facility
According to an ASML press release issued in late April, the company and TU/e have signed a memorandum of understanding under which they will jointly develop the roadmap, intended to cover research priorities in hot-button fields such as “plasma physics, artificial intelligence, mechatronics and semiconductor lithography.”
The roadmap, in turn, will guide a joint research program at the university, with “substantial and equal” investments from ASML and TU/e, that could mint up to 40 new Ph.D.’s annually. ASML, for its part, will offer up its top engineers as “hybrid teachers” and boost the number of internships it offers.
Also on the table are plans for a more tangible ASML presence on the TU/e campus. According to ASML, TU/e is working on a long-term lease to “realize a new ASML facility in the coming years” that will involve “an estimated investment of several hundred million euros.”
The proposed facility would provide space for more than 500 researchers, including several hundred ASML employees, along with shared workspaces, research labs and “a state-of-the-art cleanroom facility.” ASML believes that the collaborative cleanroom “will enable growth and synergy across academic research fields of mutual interest such as photonics, quantum computing, nanomaterials and chip manufacturing.”
Boost for “Brainport Eindhoven”
ASML’s headquarters and research campus in Veldhoven, a municipality immediately southwest of Eindhoven, Netherlands. [Image: © ASML]
In the announcement, both ASML and TU/e stressed the long-standing ties between the two institutions. “Our relationship with Eindhoven University of Technology goes back to the earliest days of ASML,” Jos Benschop, the company’s vice president for technology, said in the press release. “Our collaboration is based on a shared commitment to create meaningful innovation for society by bridging fundamental science and industrial engineering.”
The announcement also highlighted the partnership’s benefits to the Brainport Eindhoven innovative-technology region in the southern Netherlands. This region—originally given the “Brainport” moniker by the mayor of Eindhoven in 1997—includes the university and some 5,000 technology and IT companies, ranging from large, established firms such as ASML, Philips and Thermo Fisher Scientific to newer companies such as EFFECT Photonics, SMART Photonics and Lightyear. Venture-capital investment in the region’s firms has jumped in the past several years, moving from US$82 million in 2019 and US$115 million in 2020 to US$316 million in 2021 and US$266 million in 2022.
ASML Q1 2023 results
In a separate late-April announcement, ASML reported net sales of €6.7 billion (US$7.35 billion) for the first quarter of calendar 2023, versus €3.5 billion in the 2022 first quarter. Net income for the period came in at €2.0 billion (US$2.2 billion).
The company’s CEO, Peter Wennink, observed that the Q1 2023 sales, as well as the gross margin of 50.6% achieved in the period, were above the guidance ASML had previously given to investment analysts. He attributed that development to faster installation of the company’s extreme-ultraviolet and deep-ultraviolet lithography systems in response to customer requests, and to quicker customer acceptance of those installed systems. That, in turn, allowed ASML to book the revenue faster than expected.
Wennink also said the company continues “to see mixed signals on demand” from different end markets, and hinted that further adjustments to the timing of business might be in the cards going forward as the industry works to “bring inventory to more healthy levels.” Nonetheless, he stressed that the overall demand for ASML’s systems “still exceeds our capacity for this year,” with a current order backlog of more than €38.9 billion.