Intel Foundry and ASML report High NA EUV production milestone
Intel Foundry and ASML have reported continued progress in High NA EUV lithography production, including more than one million wafers processed to date across early tool certification and testing, research and development, and volume production on select layers of Intel's Panther Lake processors — part of the Core Ultra Series 3 family.
Overlay, throughput and availability are meeting Intel Foundry's expectations, and products manufactured on Intel 18A using High NA for select layers are delivering performance that meets or exceeds comparable layers patterned using conventional EUV, according to a press release from the companies.
A central topic at this week's SPIE Photomask Technology and EUV Lithography conference is reticle stitching – a technique that allows customers to use High NA EUV with today's standard 6-inch masks, without requiring the transition to the larger 6x12-inch format. Intel Foundry has also developed process design kit solutions to enable customers to floor-plan within the existing 6-inch mask format.
For more than three years, Intel Foundry has led an industry initiative to align the mask ecosystem around the larger 6x12-inch format, working with ASML, mask makers, EDA partners and materials providers to develop the standards and infrastructure needed for future High NA scaling.
"Intel Foundry has been one of the key leaders of the industry's adoption of High NA, from installing the first commercial EXE system in 2024, to qualifying the latest generation of tools, to shipping the first high-volume logic product manufactured with High NA," said Christophe Fouquet, President and CEO of ASML, in the press release.
