Every time you use AI, you are, in some small way, depending on a 42-year-old, 44,000-person Dutch company that spends \u20ac4.5 billion each year to advance its technology.<\/p>\n
ASML, headquartered in the Netherlands, makes the machines that make the chips that make AI possible. More specifically, it makes the only machines in the world capable of printing the microscopic patterns on silicon wafers that define the most advanced semiconductors \u2014 a process called extreme ultraviolet lithography, or EUV. The machines are roughly the size of a school bus, take months to assemble, involve hundreds of suppliers, and cost anywhere from $200 million to upwards of $400 million apiece depending on the generation (prices that give even ASML\u2019s biggest customers pause<\/a> occasionally).<\/p>\n That monopoly has made ASML the most valuable company in Europe, worth over $530 billion. And with the four largest American tech companies \u2014 Microsoft, Meta, Amazon and Google \u2014 committing more than $600 billion in AI infrastructure spending this year alone, demand for ASML\u2019s machines has surged to the point where the company has openly said the world won\u2019t have enough chips for years.<\/p>\n All that demand has also made ASML a target. Substrate, a San Francisco startup founded by a prot\u00e9g\u00e9 of Peter Thiel, has raised more than $100 million<\/a> and been valued at over $1 billion on the claim that it can build a rival lithography machine. Separately, there have been reports that former ASML engineers in China have partly reverse-engineered the technology<\/a>, a prospect with enormous geopolitical implications.<\/p>\n Christophe Fouquet, who became ASML\u2019s CEO in 2024 after more than a decade at the company, sat down with this editor on the rooftop deck of his Beverly Hills hotel Tuesday morning ahead of his appearance at the Milken Institute Global Conference. Dressed in a blue suit and white shirt, he was relaxed \u2014 even when the conversation turned to the rivals.<\/p>\n This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.<\/p>\n TC: Did you see the AI explosion coming?<\/p>\n Techcrunch event<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSan Francisco, CA CF: No, not at all. We worked very hard, but not with the idea that this would come. You went from a concept \u2014 something people thought would eventually arrive \u2014 to ChatGPT, which was really the first good example of what AI could do. And now I think we look at AI as the next revolution, not only industrial but societal. Did I see it coming? No. Sitting in the middle of it every day, sometimes we wake up in the morning and still check that what is happening is really happening.<\/p>\n The big question everyone has is whether the supply chain can keep pace with demand. Can it?<\/p>\n The demand is such that the market overall will be supply-limited for quite a bit. Right now, the biggest bottleneck seems to be in chip manufacturing. We, as an equipment supplier, follow our customers, and so far we\u2019ve followed them pretty well \u2014 but we know we have to step up our entire supply chain and capacity. If you talk to the hyperscalers, I think they will tell you that for the next two, three, even five years, they\u2019re not going to get enough chips.<\/p>\n TSMC made news recently saying your latest machines are too expensive. How do you respond?<\/p>\n An EUV system, if you look at the price, is going to be more expensive than a low-NA system, but the cost of making a wafer with this tool on some advanced layers will be cheaper. We can get 20%, 30% cost reduction.<\/p>\n [Editors note: both machines Fouquet is referring to here are EUV machines \u2014 the same fundamental technology. NA stands for numerical aperture, a measure of how finely a machine can focus light onto a chip. Low-NA EUV is the current generation; high-NA EUV is ASML\u2019s newest generation, capable of printing even finer patterns but carrying a price tag of $350 million or more apiece. Fouquet is arguing that even though the new machine costs more, it produces chips more cheaply.]<\/p>\n I get a lot of questions about whether it\u2019s going to be this month or next month or the month after. And I usually say it doesn\u2019t really matter, because we designed high-NA for the next 10, 20 years. You can go back to the press from 2016, 2017, and you\u2019ll find the same quotes \u2014 low-NA EUV was very pricey. We know what happened after that. The same will happen with high-NA.<\/p>\n There\u2019s a startup called Substrate, backed by Peter Thiel, claiming it can build a rival lithography machine. What do you think of it?<\/p>\n Wanting to have it and having it \u2014 that\u2019s still a huge difference. The challenges of lithography are many. Being able to make an image is a starting point, but you need to make that image in very high quantity, at very low cost, at high speed, and with nanometer accuracy. I always say the only reason ASML could build an EUV machine is because 80% of it already existed, based on previous knowledge and products built over time. We had to solve one problem \u2014 getting EUV light \u2014 and that alone took 20 years. When you start from scratch, the challenge is enormous. I\u2019ve seen a lot of claims. I\u2019ve seen a few pictures. But we had our first EUV picture 30 years ago, and we still needed 20 more years of hard work to turn it into a manufacturing system.<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tOctober 13-15, 2026\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n