undefined | Better HN

0 pointsdoikor3y ago0 comments

Lithography equipment isn't some government funded cost+ industry with 0 innovation or competition like what SpaceX had (has?) as its competition. Nobody is using equipment from 70s (Soyuz) or even early 2000s (Atlas or Delta).

It is actually the opposite. Everything is really expensive because you have to be constantly making the newest/greatest thing. A 5 year old lithography machine is pretty much useless for manufacturing high end chips (there is its own market for their output but phones and computers are not it)

Basically if you tried to do the SpaceX way of making a "good enough" rocket (Falcon 9) and use it for a decade+ you would be bankrupt very fast. Nobody wants to pay top dollar for old tech.

edit:

> aggressively trying to bring down cost-per-unit

And what makes you think ASML is not trying to do that? Every cent they save on cost-per-unit increases their profit margin.

0 comments

bradknowles3y ago

I worked at ASML for several months in the early 2000s. One of the most surprising things to me was the very long tail they had for old equipment in the field that was still being actively used, and therefore had to be actively supported. Like, stuff that was ten or even twenty years old. I seriously doubt that this situation has materially changed.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse