There’s a $200M–$400M machine that is built by ONE company in the Netherlands that quietly enabled the entire AI revolution.... and almost no one knows it exists.
In this video, we break down how EUV lithography actually works:
• why AI models needed smaller and smaller transistors
• why normal light couldn’t print features this small
• how molten tin droplets exploding into plasma create 13.5 nm light
• how mirrors flat to the atom shape that light
• and how every advanced chip—from iPhones to NVIDIA GPUs—is printed using this one impossible system
If you’ve ever wondered how GPUs got fast enough to train ChatGPT, this is the real story.
TIMESTAMPS
00:00 Introduction to the Wildest Machine
01:00 The Need for Extreme Ultraviolet Lithography (EUV)
01:46 What is EUV?
02:10 Creating EUV Light: The Sci-Fi Process
02:59 The Flattest Mirrors on Earth
04:18 How EUV Prints a Chip
05:17 EUV's Role in the AI Boom
06:05 ASML: The Company Behind EUV
Sources & Further Reading:
• ASML EUV Fundamentals
• Zeiss EUV Optics Papers
• TSMC 3nm Process & Density Briefs
• ASML Annual Report (Machine cost + specs)
• Research on EUV plasma generation & laser systems