ASML Holding N.V., one of the world’s largest developers and manufacturers of photolithography systems, has reported that there was a fire in part of its Berlin-based factory.
The incident occurred during the night last week and was extinguished without any injuries. In a short statement the following day, ASML stated that it was “too early to make any statement on the damage or whether the incident will have any impact on the output plan for this year. It will take a few days to conduct a thorough investigation and make a full assessment. As soon as we have such assessment, we will provide an update”.
ASML is one of the largest suppliers of photolithography systems primarily for the semiconductor industry and the sole supplier of extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) photolithography machines in the world. The Dutch company was founded in 1984 and is vital to the continued production of computer chips globally for companies such as Intel.
The fire took place in ASML Berlin, which manufactures components for ASML’s lithography systems, including wafer tables and clamps, reticle chucks and mirror blocks. The fire occurred in a part of one production building on the site in Berlin and the smoke partly impacted an adjacent building.
Whilst ASML has already resumed production in parts of these buildings, the other buildings on the site were not affected and are fully operational. The company stated that its impact assessment of the damage is ongoing but revealed that its Metrology and Inspection output plans are not affected as they do not contain any components made in Berlin.
The manufacturing of deep ultraviolet (DUV) components has been restarted although there was some disruption regarding components. The company expects to remediate this in such a way that it will not affect the output and revenue plan for DUV. As to EUV, the fire affected part of the production area of the wafer clamp, a module in ASML’s EUV systems. The firm is still in the process of completing the recovery plan for this production area and determining how to minimize any potential impact for our EUV customers, both in its output plan and in field service.
On January 19, 2022, ASML will present its Q4 and full-year 2021 results, as well as its initial view on the year 2022. With this, it expects to provide a further update on the incident.
You can find more information about ASML and the fire at its Berlin factory on its website.
Stay up to date with the most recent automation, computer vision, machine vision and robotics news on Automate Pro Europe, CVPro, MVPro and RBPro.
