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The US says ASML’s top chip tool may be in China. ASML says it isn’t

32 d ago

U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has told ASML executives he is concerned that one of the Dutch chipmaker’s extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography machines—the only tools capable of printing the most advanced semiconductor patterns—may have ended up in China, according to Bloomberg. That would be a major breach of export controls barring ASML from selling EUV to China since the first Trump administration. Senior administration officials claim evidence that ASML shipped EUV-related components and transport equipment to China, but have declined to show it. ASML says no such machine exists in China. ASML is the most important company in the global AI buildout after Nvidia, as every cutting-edge chip from TSMC depends on its EUV tools—a monopoly built over two decades. ASML CEO Christophe Fouquet told Bloomberg that the company tracks every machine ever shipped, maintains an internal firewall separating EUV-accessible employees from China-based staff, and that no Chinese entity has ever possessed an EUV system. He also noted that ASML sells older deep ultraviolet (DUV) tools to China—expected to account for roughly 20% of 2026 revenue—but framed that as a protective measure to maintain a generational gap and avoid creating a future competitor. Separately, the Commerce Department under Lutnick agreed to invest up to $150 million in xLight, a startup developing next-generation light-source technology that could challenge ASML’s EUV monopoly, though xLight’s CEO says it aims to partner with ASML, not replace it. Peter Thiel has also backed Substrate, a startup explicitly pursuing a rival EUV technology. A bipartisan bill in Congress would effectively ban all ASML DUV shipments to China, though the Trump administration has not taken a formal position.