The most valuable company in Europe thanks to the unique technology in the world

It is difficult to imagine that within an ordinary corporate building, with so much glass and steel, would be made what is at present perhaps the most valuable machine in the world.

There’s a reason the technology behind it is at the heart of a fierce race in which the United States and China are vying to try to be the dominant superpowers of the future.

The plant is located in the south of the Netherlands and belongs to ASML, a company that has become the most valuable technology company in Europe.

What is produced? It designs and manufactures machines that produce computer chips, but not just any chip.

They are the world’s most advanced microchip making machines, and ASML is the only company on the planet that has this kind of technology.

This effective monopoly means that the precise operation of ASML devices is subject to some of the most stringent enterprise security measures in the world.

Which didn’t stop them from letting us visit their factory and explaining the basics of what they do and how they do it.

Microchips are made by building intricate patterns of transistors, or miniature switches, layer by layer, on a tiny surface of silicon.

They are printed using a lithographic system in which light is projected through the plane of the pattern of these miniature switches.

The light is then reduced and focused using advanced optics, and the pattern is etched onto a kind of light-sensitive silicon wafer.

This pattern forms the circuitry for a silicon microchip, which can end up in a computer, phone, or other electrical device.

The goal is to try to make the best, most efficient microchip on a large scale, the smaller the better.

This is where the differentiation component of the most advanced ASML devices comes in, which can operate at tiny scales that generate ultra-soft ultraviolet light, as small as 13.5 nanometers.

We are talking about strands finer than a human hair, which range from 50 to 100,000 nanometers.

Sander Hofman from ASML likens it to using different-tip pens.

“Because of the small wavelength, you’re using a very good duplicator now to draw these lines on integrated circuits, as opposed to previous generation machines that maybe used a stylus,” said Hofmann.

The ability to etch silicon with these microcircuits allows more components to be inserted into the silicon, which in turn means that electronic devices can have more processing power and more memory while remaining the same size.

The machines operate in a vacuum, because the entire microchip production process can be damaged by the slightest impurity, such as a particle of skin.

When we visited the factory, technician Bram Matthijssen was assembling one of the latest ASML designs in what appeared to be one of the cleanest environments on the planet.

“There are times when we have to wear gloves to make sure we don’t leave any fingerprints, and therefore make sure we don’t get extra dust in the device,” Mattisen said.

He stressed that “a single fingerprint … can cause significant damage to the device.”

The machines are very large and complex. An EUV machine can take up to a year to be assembled and delivered.

In 2022, the company has delivered just 50 of its high-spec models, 400 machines in all.

The sales, which added to revenue from operating and upgrading existing machinery, made ASML about $22.7 billion last year.

The orders they have in their wallet double that number. This sales growth translates into an increase in the workforce, which has increased by a third in the past 12 months.

The machines that make ASML take years, or even decades, to develop and perfect, says Wayne Lamm, a consultant at technology research firm CCS Insights.

One such example is their high-spec hardware that ASML has been working on since the early 2000s, which leaves other companies in the industry with a great deal of work to do.

“I’m sure there are competitors in the making… However, in the near term, there are no real competitors for ASML,” he says.

Not bad for a company the BBC once described simply as “relatively unknown,” a quote Hoffmann pinned to his sweatshirt.

The battle between the United States and China

Being a critical cog in the global electronics industry comes with some difficulties.

ASML is currently caught in the middle of a battle between the US and China.

Beijing has always wanted to make the most advanced computer chips, for which it needs ASML machines.

But since 2019, Washington has been effectively blocking ASML from exporting those machines to China.

Joris Terre, an analyst at The Hague Center for Strategic Studies, says the United States is interested in preventing China from catching up in microchip technology.

“The United States has changed its objectives, from being two generations ahead of its competitors, to having the greatest possible advantage, which may also mean pushing your opponents back as far as possible,” he says.

There have been reports that Dutch and US authorities have reached an agreement over ASML exports, but no details have been disclosed.

ASML itself responded to the news with a statement explaining that any restrictions will require a lot of work and time before the legislation can be implemented.

Although ASML CEO Peter Winnink does not think his company will be seriously affected by the export restrictions in the long term.

“If semiconductors cannot be made in China, they will be made in South Korea, the United States, Europe and Taiwan,” he said.

“In the end we will send those machines because the world needs that capacity,” he said.

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