Will ASML take its maskless technology off the shelf and bring it to market in the coming years? René Raaijmakers thinks so, although that’s purely a gut feeling.
Shortly after 2000, ASML conducted extensive research into the viability of maskless lithography. With good reason. At that time, lithography for chips seemed to be running into a wall. Machines with calcium fluoride optics and 157nm laser sources were tough (and were scrapped in 2003), immersion was just emerging and EUV was still highly uncertain.
It’s hardly imaginable anymore, but a quarter century ago, there were fierce discussions about the technological-strategic direction in Veldhoven. Besides 157 nm, immersion and EUV, it also seemed like a good idea to investigate whether it would be economically attractive to project chip patterns (or parts thereof) pixel by pixel. After all, mask costs were rising exponentially and the number of interconnect layers was increasing.
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