US tells ASML it’s concerned one of its chipmaking tools may be in China

[BENGALURU] US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has told ASML that Washington is concerned that one of its top chipmaking machines may have found its way to China in violation of US-led export restrictions, Bloomberg News reported on Thursday (Jun 18).

Lutnick expressed these concerns to senior leaders of the Dutch firm in a series of meetings, the report said. ASML has pushed back against those concerns, noting that EUV, or extreme ultraviolet, lithography tools used to print tiny chip circuits are made in small quantities and require constant upkeep from ASML employees, according to the report.

ASML’s most advanced EUV systems are roughly the size of a school bus and weigh 180 tonnes. “ASML has never shipped an EUV machine to China nor have we shipped to China any component, module or equipment specially designed to be used in an EUV machine,” Bloomberg quoted an ASML spokesperson as saying.

The US Commerce Department, ASML and the White House were not immediately available for comment outside business hours when contacted by Reuters.

Reuters reported in December that Chinese scientists have developed a prototype of an EUV machine that was built by a team of former engineers from ASML, an effort described as China’s version of the Manhattan Project. REUTERS