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by drexlspivey 1572 days ago
The US cant block a european company from doing anything
8 comments

You think ASML wants to run afoul with the US, even if they can't force ASML? The main reason ASML has EUV is because it was funded by the US government to develop it. Now the tech is mostly ASMLs own, but they still have close ties to the US.

USA didn't have to force ASML to stop selling to China, they just had to ask them nicely.

> The main reason ASML has EUV is because it was funded by the US government to develop it

That seems like 20% true. The US had a brief EUV program ("EUV LLC") in the late 90s - it wasn't much compared to how much difficult, risky, and expensive development obviously still needed to be done afterwards. The EU also has basic semiconductor research, notably IMEC.

I have also seen that claim in a YouTube video by "Asianometry" and I wonder what the original source of that apparent misinformation is.

Asianometry youtube channel is just a guy reading Wikipedia entries over a slideshow.
The company (originally named ASM Lithography, current name ASML, which is an official name and not an abbreviation)[10] was founded in 1984 as a joint venture between the Dutch companies Advanced Semiconductor Materials International (ASMI) and Philips.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASML_Holding

The core ASML EUV technology is from their US subsidiary Cymer. All that IP is domiciled in the US. In addition, most of the critical semiconductor components throughout the scanner (FPGA, high performance analog, etc) come from American companies
They're currently blocking it from doing business with China right now.
They can, since ASML are using US technology. Especially after ASML brought out Cymer.
If I recall properly, and if I trust what I read/viewed from the internet ages ago, EUV optics is from Germany (zeiss), and the EUV light is from cymer. cymer almost lost their part because they had been unable to deliver enough EUV light power for too long (in the end, it seems they shine their massive CO2 laser on a tin droplet, 2 times instead of one and yield enough power). mask/wafer alignment equipment, dunno where they are from (nanometric piezo-electric motors, with probably laser interferometer). Then, at the time everything was run in extreme vaccum, but heard something about hydrogen gas.
From what I read regarding the current block, USA couldn't force ASML under current US law, because ASML uses less than 25% US technology.

But USA didn't have to force them. ASML's EUV tech started out as a US funded venture, so I don't think they want to start a fight with USA.

And USA could obviously change its laws to block sales of technology even if less than 25% of the end product is from USA.

They can pretty effectively. Not directly of course, but they can make life harder for said European company if they don't follow their sanctions.
They can and have. ASML is blocked from selling EUV machines to China.
ASML was created with mostly US technology company investments and US patents. So yes, they can. (And did.)
They can block Nordstream 2...
It's the Cold War and national security is at stake, you're not going far enough.

Think back to what went on from 1950-1990 in Europe and Asia, except it'll be even worse.

Blocking Nordstream 2 is the very bottom of the barrel compared to what's coming.

After a brief slumber the Russian Empire has awoken again in Europe and it's annexing territory (again). The Dutch would be foolish to spar with the US over ASML at this juncture. Dealing with Russia in Europe and China in Asia will take a concerted front by the US, Europe and their allies.

remember the Russian Empire has an economy the size of Italy. it does a lot of posturing and no doubt it can cause a worldwide mess if it stops exporting energy, but they're an empire in name only.
> remember the Russian Empire has an economy the size of Italy.

And a nuclear arsenal roughly the size of the second through fifth largest in the world, combined, and an inventory of main battle tanks roughly equal, quantitatively, to the second through fourth largest in the world, combined, etc.

When a country has outsized relative military capacity vs. relative economic capacity, especially when compared to their immediate neighbors, there is a very strong historical pattern of use or threat of use of the military capacity as a lever to achieve economic and/or territorial aspirations.

It can fail (while there can be a lag time, economic power is eventually transformable into military capacity), but it isn't unusual for it to succeed, or for the eventual failure to be at the end of a long and bloody conflict.

i agree completely. especially so if the leader of said country wants to leave 'a legacy' and/or is going slightly mad.
Germany did that