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TIP746: ASML: Europe's Tech Monopoly
01:11:11
Clay unpacks the extraordinary rise of ASML — a little-known Dutch company that quietly became the most important player in global technology.
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Host
You're listening to tip.
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Narrator
While the spotlight often shines on companies like Nvidia, Apple and Tesla, there's a single European company that all big tech players rely on to provide cutting edge technology. That company is ASML. Since its IPO in 1995, shares of ASML have compounded at 20% per year, turning a $10,000 investment into into more than $6 million today. Headquartered in the small Dutch town of Veldhoven, ASML has built one of the most critical monopolies in modern technology. ASML is the sole manufacturer of the extreme ultraviolet lithography machines that are used to produce the world's most advanced semiconductor chips. These machines, which can cost over $300 million apiece, are feats of engineering so complex that they require over 100,000 precision parts to assemble. What makes ASML's story so compelling is how it rose from a struggling spinoff in the 1980s to a linchpin in the global economy today, all while overtaking Japanese competition, navigating US China geopolitical tensions, and building a technological lead that competitors may never catch up with. On today's episode, we'll explore ASML's origin story, the dual leadership that drove its rise, the geopolitical pressures that are shaping the company's future, and the risks and opportunities it presents for investors. To help tell that story, I'll be sharing the key lessons from the book the ASML Way by Mark Hijink. For those who are interested in learning more about asml, I would highly recommend picking up a copy of the book yourself. Also, we're coming up on our TIP Summit event in Big Sky, Montana that we're hosting in late September 2025. We'll be gathering a select group of TIP listeners to go hiking, do some fly fishing, enjoy great food and network with like minded listeners of the show in one of the most beautiful settings here in the United States. Our goal is to create an unforgettable experience for our attendees and have you leaving with friendships that will last for many years to come. We have a couple more spots open and we're getting our list of attendees finalized, so if you're interested, you can apply to join us by the end of August on our website@theinvestorspodcast.com summit. That's theinvestorspodcast.com summit. With that, let's get right to it.
- [02:38]
Host
Since 2014 and through more than 180 million downloads, we've studied the financial markets and read the books that influence self made billionaires the most. We keep you informed and prepared for the unexpected. Now for your host playfink.
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Narrator
ASML is one of the most important companies in the world, yet most people have no idea what it does or why it holds such immense strategic power. ASML is the sole manufacturer of EUV lithography machines, which is the core technology enabling the production of the most advanced semiconductor chips. Without asml, companies like Apple, Nvidia and TSMC could not use or produce the chips that power everything from iPhones to AI data centers. To uncover what exactly makes up the DNA of asml, I picked up the book titled Focus the ASML Way Inside the Power Struggle over the Most Complex Machine on Earth by Mark Hijink. This book was released in June 2024 and HiPink brings us a unique insider's view of this global giant. Hijink not only distills the company's meteoric rise from a quiet town in the Netherlands to a powerful global monopoly position, but he also makes accessible the unbelievably complex technology that has been the key to ASML success. Its lithography machines, which spit out millions of chips around the clock, work to an accuracy of within a few atoms. Now, today, China is trying to copy ASML's technology and the US has ASML on their side as it's developing its own chip manufacturing industry. The global chip industry has exploded in recent years and ASML is doing everything it can just to keep up with demand. This growth in semiconductor chip demand has led to extraordinary returns for shareholders of asml. There's a lot to the story of asml, but I'll do my very best here to distill it down to a podcast. And since I'm by no means an expert on semiconductors, I'll also do my best not to make the episode too technical, so please bear with me here. The story of ASML originates with a company called Philips, which in the early 1970s employed 400,000 people, many of whom worked in the Netherlands. Philips was an old fashioned conglomerate that made everything in house, which included products like TVs, radios, medical equipment and household appliances. At the time, Philips was the second largest manufacturer of semiconductors in the world and a lot of innovation within the space was happening there. However, their semiconductor arm had a number of issues being under the Philips umbrella, one of which was that the semiconductor space required high levels of innovation, which was incongruent with the bureaucracy that you tended to find in these legacy companies such as Philips. During this time, the semiconductor arm that was responsible for innovation, also known as Natlab was was working on a silicon repeater, which they believed was an essential breakthrough the industry needed to take the next step forward. The silicon repeater, otherwise known as the wafer stepper, would allow chip manufacturers to produce chips with far more precision and efficiency than would ever have been possible with the conventional machines. Although this would have been a major innovation, Philips was running into financial trouble and was in the midst of spinning off capital intensive parts of their company. The lithography segment was not a cash cow for Philips because it was purely used for their own business and other companies were not really benefiting from the innovations that were happening within the company. A man by the name of Wim Troost really saw what was possible with the technologies that the natlab division was developing and where things might be heading in the future. Troost knew that it would simply never be profitable to only produce chip machines for Philip's own factories. So he traveled to Asia and traveled to the US to try and garner interest from others to try and, you know, get them to buy, you know, these machines that they were producing. His efforts to sell the machines were unsuccessful and Truus was running out of time, money and options. This led him to pursue teaming up with successful Dutch entrepreneur Arthur Del Prado, whose company ASM International was also working on chip machines and had just completed a successful IPO on the nasdaq. Both Troost and Del Prato understood that the lithography machine was at the heart of chip production and the machine was the single most important strategic decisions that a chip manufacturer has to make. Del Prado also recognized the potential with natlab's wafer stepper and wanted in on that action. So in 1983 the Natlab division of Philips and Delprado's company would enter a joint venture deal to create advanced semiconductor materials Lithography, or what the company is known as today, which is asml. And the company would be based in the Netherlands. From the beginning, the odds of success were really against them. The technical know how time and money needed to make it as a lithography manufacturer on your own were significant. However, the industry's standard machines had their limit and a leap in the available technology was now needed to produce chips with smaller resolutions. No established lithography manufacturer had the technology for this except for one company, that was Philips. So ASML was positioned to potentially capitalize on this opportunity. But it would still be no easy feat as those purchasing lithography machines expected them to be virtually faultless in their reliability. In May of 1984, ASML attended a trade fair in the heart of Silicon Valley for suppliers of lithography machines. None of the chip manufacturers showed any interest in ASML as they hadn't sold any machines to date. From the outset, it appeared that ASML had its work cut out for them. Their CEO at the time, Gialt Smith, was determined to give ASML a real shot at success. So he set his on developing a machine that would far surpass the capabilities of the legacy players who were more focused on their existing technologies that would inevitably be made obsolete. SMIT ended up talking ASM International and philips into a 200 million guilder investment. And under the leadership of Smit, ASML really embraced a culture of winning at all costs. And employee counts would skyrocket as they focus their attention on selling to the US chip manufacturers. Two of the initial key hires during this joint venture period were Martin vandenbrink and Fritz van Hout. It turned out that these two would really determine the future of asml. Martin vandenbrink was incredibly technically gifted, while Fritz understood the technology and he was really more of a people person. Martin is probably the most referenced person in the book. He joined ASML at the age of 27 and today he serves on the supervisory board. At the age of 67. One of the pioneering engineers referred to the arrival of Martin vandenbrink as an act of God because he just made such a big impact on their early innovations. Hijink writes here VandenBrink came up with an improved system that can measure both alignment patterns. The machine worked faster than the competitors with far fewer deviations and his idea was immediately worth a patent. This was a huge win for the company. End quote coming in. Martin was an expert in electronics and mathematics. He's someone who would really erupt at any moment if he felt that someone was just talking nonsense or beating around the bush. You never had to wait long to know exactly what Martin thought. As far as he was concerned, engineering was all about solving problems, not avoiding them. Martin would challenge those around him and question everything. His bold and ruthless attitude would become one of the main pillars of asml. Martin would really embody what the book is titled, which is focus to solve problems as complex as developing a lithography machine. It was a non negotiable skill to have. ASML immediately wanted to play at the highest level and compete alongside USA's GCA and Japan's Nikon, the big hitters in the industry at the time. In the press Smit exuded self confidence stating in this industry only one business Strategy is conceivable. Focus on first place. If you decide you'll be satisfied with bronze before you start, you'll probably end up sixth. Then you're done for end quote. ASML started out by focusing on the chip companies just below the top end of the market. These were the manufacturers in a position to compete, yet looking to find ways to expand their production at lower costs. These companies were more willing to take a risk on the Dutch newcomer who took ownership of their work. Meanwhile, Nikon and Canon would dominate the top end of the market, selling to companies like intel and IBM. AMD would end up being the very first company to give ASML a real shot as they placed an order of 25 machines to be delivered by 1987. After some hot internal debates, CEO Smit would end up leaving ASML and would pass the torch to Wynn Troost, who would run the company for two years. In light of the shakeup internally, ASM International did not have the capital to continue to fund ASML and leaving them no choice but to withdraw from the joint venture which ironically led Philips to take over their ownership. This breakup left a bitter taste in Arthur Del Prado's mouth as he was the founder of ASM International and he was often referred to as the father of the European semiconductor equipment industry. In the mid-1980s, the semiconductor industry would enter a downturn. This gave ASML the opportunity to be a bit more aggressive and since they had the backing of both Philips and the Dutch government giving them subsidies. The Dutch government helped fund another initiative referred to as the Mega project, which was really largely a failure, but it ended up catching the attention of a man named Morris. Chang was the former technical director of the US Company Texas Instruments and was an expert in the semiconductor space. Chang was chosen by the Taiwanese government to be the leader in establishing their chip industry and they promised to cover any and all costs. This would mark the start of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, otherwise known as TSMC. And Philips would end up taking a 28% stake in TSMC and sharing the expertise cultivated from the megaproject. This partnership would also open the door for ASML to get their machines onto TSMC's factory floors and which was obviously a massive win. Hijink writes here. With the partnership between TSMC and ASML in full swing, the Taiwanese chip industry proceeded to boom. The two companies turned out to be surprisingly like minded. Both functioned in an equally speedy and chaotic manner, with each totally dependent on the other to churn out endless piles of wafers every hour, free of faulty chips we have their backs and they have ours was the mantra of the ASML team. This one sentence became the formula for dominating the chip market. End quote. TSMC would then grow to become the world's most advanced chip manufacturer and turn Taiwan into the world's supplier of advanced computing power. As a result, the US fell far behind in global chip production as intel simply could not keep up with the rise of TSMC. In 1985, the US would account for 50% of global chip production and today that figure sits at just 10%. ASML would barely stay alive. In the early 90s, under the leadership of Willem Maris, the company focused on the development and assembly of machines and would end up buying around 90% of the parts they used, some of which came from other Dutch companies that worked with Philips as well. In those early days, ASML only had two requirements from its suppliers. First, the work had to be good, and second, it needed to be fast. In the same year that ASML was founded, a research institute in Belgium was also started. This was referred to as imic. No one building a chip factory, or fob, wanted to run the risk of investing in the wrong technology. And all the steps needed to produce a working chip are intertwined. And even the smallest change can have a huge impact on the process as a whole. So IMEC established itself as a high tech garage where the entire industry went to figure out where the industry was heading in the future. IMEC housed equipment from all the major suppliers, and with their eyes initially set on the lithography machines coming from Japan and the us, they did not expect to find new innovations coming from just north of them in the Netherlands. By this time, ASML had now become somewhat established, with the players just below the top end of the market. But to become a company that was built to weather through the cyclicality of the industry, they would need to capture share from the top players as well. Martin VandenBrink would be the project leader for the PAS 5500, which, as hygiene puts it, if the name of any device deserves to be remembered, it was this one. The PAS 5500 was the first in the industry to utilize modular design, and 30 years later, these machines are still stamping chips today. The device was broken down into roughly 10 components that would be independently manufactured and like pieces of a puzzle, would click together in the factory to form a single working system. The individual modules are produced in a series, making it easier to upgrade individual designs and swap out components at will. This way, the machine you buy is never the final product. Every part of the machine can be continually improved upon. It would be like ratcheting in a new, more powerful engine for your car instead of upgrading the whole car entirely. While this sounds great, the development of the machine in the early 90s would lead ASML to burn through more cash than they could afford to, Especially since the industry overall was in a slump. By 1993, ASML would turn its first year of profit. In 1994, they sold more than 100 lithography machines, and two years later, that figure would double. Meanwhile, Samsung started to run into some issues with their Japanese supplier and gained an interest in ASML's machines to produce memory chips. Their meetings with Samsung in Korea felt more like interrogations, as Samsung made outrageous demands to try and ensure they could sustain their razor thin margins. In 1995, an agreement was reached, and thus ASML started to achieve its goal of topping Japanese competition and poaching the big players. To do so, they needed to add more value for the chip makers by offering tools that could expose as many wafers per hour with as few defects as possible. Lithography technology is essentially a printing press, but instead of books, papers, or dollar bills, these machines print semiconductors. And with these, you can make billions of dollars. Since the Design of the 5500 model was costly, ASML was not too keen on developing a new machine like Martin Vandenbrink wanted. So Martin was looking to leave the firm because he wanted to work somewhere that wanted to innovate and be a pioneer in the industry. The CEO did not want to do anything that would jeopardize potentially losing Martin, so they pivoted their entire strategy just to keep him. So Martin would go on to develop a step and scan technology, which hijink equates to having an Olympic runner taking off at top speed and being able to write pen to paper with accurate precision, which can give you sort of an idea of the technical feats that these machines are achieving. Since ASML needed more capital to continue their innovation efforts, they decided to go public in 1995 on the NASDAQ exchange as well as the Amsterdam Exchange. $10,000 invested at the IPO in 1995 would go on to be worth over $6 million today. Ironically, many people who were close to ASML were reducing their stakes in light of their success. Phillips trimmed their stake on the IPO. Richard George, ASML's project leader from the beginning. He sold his shares, and their COO had declined an option plan that led him to miss out on 20 million euros had he accepted goes to show that even those most familiar with some of these amazing companies can miss out on the substantial amount of potential gains in being equity holders. And the likely reason is that they can see the risks involved. They can see how difficult it is to succeed in this industry, how fierce the competition is, and how much intellectual rigor and willpower is invested just to stay ahead of everybody else. For me, this is really a key lesson from the ASML story and a reminder that we should not beat ourselves up for not betting big on some of these big winners, or not betting at all on a company that we've looked at in the past. It's simply a part of the game of investing and we need to keep our focus more on what it is we can actually control and understand. Well, during the IPO process, Peter Winink was a young accountant at Deloitte and he assisted with the IPO and and he would actually eventually go on to become ASML CEO. From 2013 to 2024, WinInk was a partner with Deloitte. He was a quick learner, exceptionally talented with numbers and working with people and this made him a really great fit for a leadership role at asml. Hijink writes here, Winning felt liberated by the culture of asml. No one set themselves above another and everyone, including the leaders, was held accountable. He had said within asml, it's all about humility. It's not about you, but the bigger goal we all want to achieve together. In 1999, Morris would depart from his CEO role and replacing him would be Doug Dunn, who was the former head of Philips Semiconductor Division and was CEO until 2004. At this point, ASML was producing over 200 lithography machines annually and to continue their rapid pace of growth, Dunn and Winning needed to install greater discipline in the organization to keep costs down, making room for higher return investments going forward. Let's take a quick break and hear from today's sponsors.
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Alright, back to the show. Up to this point, ASML ran more like a startup, getting the innovations in the production done by whatever means possible, with little regard for minimizing costs in the process. Many engineers were uninterested in keeping spinning in check, Hijink writes. Although such disinterest is common among engineers, the reason so many felt at home in Veldhoven was precisely because of the harmony between their values and the culture of the company. ASML had its roots firmly in the Rhenish model, in which money is not the sole benchmark of success and profit is only really visible over the long term. In the economics of Rhenish countries such as Switzerland, Germany and France, solidarity and craftsmanship are traditionally deemed far more important than a polished set of quarterly figures. However, as the company and its worth grew, a style of management started to seep in from a world that revolved around short term profit and the satisfaction of shareholders. The more Anglo Saxon style. End quote. So I thought that was a really interesting piece from the book. Being mindful of costs is essential in the semiconductor industry because you need to be prepared for those downturns in the market. Around the year 2000, ASML had the capacity to produce 700 machines per year, and after the dot com crash they sold just 200 as canceled orders from the chip manufacturers poured in daily. Whether ASML liked it or not, a downturn is bound to happen about once every five years, which means that one year orders could double and then in the next year orders could get cut in half. In October of 2001, one month after the attack on the twin Towers in New York City, ASML declared a state of emergency and cut 23% of its workforce, which amounted to 2,000 workers in total. This was also just after they acquired an American competitor, Silicon Valley Group, which doubled their workforce to around 8,000 employees. SVG had intel as a customer, and they wanted to use this as leverage to work their way to market leadership. The SVG acquisition needed to be reviewed and approved by US regulators, which involved a long and arduous process, as the US Needs to approve any acquisition in the space by foreign entities. Intel argued that the acquisition was necessary to advance lithography technology, which was in America's interest. The acquisition of SVG was successful in the sense that it did allow them to secure intel as a customer, as they had seen the success that TSMC had by using ASML machines. By 2001, Japanese competition had taken note of ASML stealing market share and unleashed an attack of their own on the company. One December morning, CEO Doug Dunn arrived at his desk to find that Nikon had accused ASML of infringing on 13 patents. While Nikon had an extensive portfolio of patents having been in operation since 1917, ASML operated more like a young startup in comparison. After filing these accusations in the us, If ASML was declared to have even one patent violation, then they would not be able to supply machines to American manufacturers. Dunn's lawyers had told him, they want to destroy you, communicating that Nikon wasn't interested in any negotiations or settling. Luckily for asml, the patents did not hold up in court, sounding the victory bell for the Dutch manufacturer. This taught ASML the importance of patents and regulations. As they were rapidly innovating, they needed to be aware of the patents currently in place and protect the innovations that they themselves would come up with, which isn't the natural thing to do if you're purely focused on creating the best possible product. To have to record everything in excruciating detail is just not fun. As a result of these efforts, by 2023, ASML would go on to have registered more than 16,000 patents. One of the growing pains that ASML went through was working with a company called Zeiss, which was probably their most important supplier. Zeiss manufactured optical systems like lenses and mirrors, which amazingly, would account for around one fourth of the value of the lithography machine. If ASML wanted to grow fast, then they would likely need Zeiss to grow fast as well. However, asm, they were a much different company than asml. Asml tended to attract cowboys who wanted to shoot faster than the shadows. While Zeiss fancied themselves as a traditional scientific institute, that was slower and they were more calculated in their decision making. Another struggle was determining what type of pricing structure was really fair. Both companies were offering tremendously valuable services, and it's likely that both felt that they were getting the short end of the stick at times. The other issue was aligning incentives. There might be times where ASML suddenly cancels its orders of lenses because they were in an industry downturn, but if ASML does not share in the potential losses of such a cancellation, then there's really no real incentive to keep them from doing the same thing in the future. ASML's success depended on them keeping good relations with suppliers, because they are only really as strong as their weakest link. If they aren't able to get just one critical part in these incredibly complex machines that they're making, then they're toast. And if ASML isn't able to get their machines to the chip manufacturers, then they're in trouble. It's estimated that 30% of the capital invested in a chip manufacturer is allocated to the lithography machines. It's an essential tool for transforming cheap and plentiful silicon into valuable chips. At the chip manufacturers, the lithography machines are running around 98 to 99% of the time if they're receiving proper maintenance, and they tend to produce 200 to 300 wafers of chips per hour, with each wafer being worth up to $250,000. Due to the complexity of the process and the machine, setbacks are inevitable and the manufacturers never know when an issue needs to arise and ASML engineers need to look under the hood. It would be practically impossible for ASML to produce these machines entirely fault proof from the beginning, so they really just make them the best they can and fix any issues along the way. The chip manufacturing sites are closed off from the real world and are among some of the most dust free environments in the world as just the slightest things could impact the production of these chips. If we jump ahead to January 9, 2007, Apple unveiled the device that would change everything and was said to have been able to do it all. Calls, emails, videos, music, everything. Steve Jobs, who's the king of product presentations, would walk out on stage to a standing ovation. Sporting his trademark jeans and black turtleneck, Jobs explained to an ecstatic crowd that the iPhone was no old fashioned telephone with cumbersome buttons and baby software. It's a fully fledged computer with Just one button and a touch screen. It was magic. All in the palm of your hand. The introduction of the iPhone marked the start of a revolution in mobile technology that would irrevocably alter daily life. Once billions of eyeballs caught sight of the revolution, they really never looked away as an app. For everything was created and. And the pockets gradually got lighter as every accessory in our lives would be integrated into this one device. This revolution, of course, also changed the chip industry. The smartphone is itself a killer app and an indispensable tool that demands ever increasing memory, processing power and sensors. In 2006, intel was supplying Apple's computers, and they were asked if they could also supply the processor for the iPhone. And they actually declined, stating that the margins in mobile chips were far too small for such a company. In Hijink's words, this was a blunder of historic proportions, considering that There are now 1.5 billion iPhones in circulation. Intel had shot themselves in the foot. So Apple went on to develop its first chips for the iPad and iPhone themselves. After acquiring a chip company called PA Semi. Apple also benefited heavily from TSMC's new production techniques, as the Taiwanese manufacturer became the first to figure out how to create chip structures using 5 nanometer technology. If you're wondering how small that is, look at your hand and count to five. Your fingernail grows at a rate of one nanometer per second. And just for reference, one nanometer is one millionth of a millimeter. In other words, these chip manufacturers are dealing with the tiniest of details. And guess who creates the only machine in the entire world that can manufacture these ultra thin lines? You guessed it, it's asml. Apple's growth also benefited from Moore's Law, which is the observation that the number of transistors on a microchip doubles about every two years, which brings exponential growth in computing power and efficiency. In the late 90s, ASML bet that this would continue through extreme ultraviolet light, or EUV for short. The closest place that you can find extreme ultraviolet light in the natural world is 93 million miles away at the sun's corona. But it could be produced on earth with extremely sophisticated technology. If ASML were to crack the code on using EUV technology in their chip production, they would have a virtual monopoly in the industry. However, this would prove to be no easy task. As Hygenk writes, EUV light was, and still is, extremely difficult to generate and sustain in an industrial environment. The invisible rays are absorbed by almost all materials, even the air, which means the lithography machines need to have mirrors in place of lenses and can only operate in a vacuum. Getting a grip on this technology was battling the limits of what was considered to be physically possible. So this research on EUV technology promised to consume a lot of capital, with no guarantees of it actually working for commercial use. Which is why Japanese companies like Nikon and Canon dropped out of the euv race. In 2006, Martin Vandenbrink sold the first EUV machine to Samsung with delivery for 2010. So the clock had officially started for them to really figure out the whole concept. As a side note, it would not be until 2018 that Samsung would get a fully capable EUV machine ready for their facilities. Vannenbrink saw they were really consuming more and more capital, which became an issue given that they would be entering the great financial crisis in 2008. The financial world coming to a grinding halt meant that the market for lithography machines would also come to a standstill. Never before had ASML seen such a sharp and sudden drop off in demand. ASML received support from the government to keep many of their factory workers employed, even though machines did not necessarily need to be made at the time. But they also received some political pushback because they were in good financial standing. They had 1.3 billion euros in reserves, and they were receiving 15 million euros from the government and also paying out tens of millions of euros in dividends to investors. Some politicians viewed this as unnecessary support, as ASML had the money to compensate their employees and continued to pay a dividend. ASML pushed back by arguing that paying dividends helped prevent stable shareholders from leaving. This did not keep the stock from falling over 50% in one year. ASML managed to weather through the crisis just fine and fend off activists from buying up the company. And as the lithography market rebounded, they set their sights on expanding their market share for lithography machines for processors and memory chips from 50% to 80%. Since they continue to invest in R and D throughout the crisis, it served as an opportunity to gain an even bigger lead on their Japanese competition. Shortly after, TSMC would place an order for EUV machines. And it was in 2013 that TSMC would take over the production of Apple's mobile chips, which were previously made by Samsung. By 2012, ASML was still working on perfecting the EUV technology, and one of their suppliers, named Cymer, had essentially told them that this was an issue that they just couldn't crack. They would not be able to figure out this EUV technology. This left Vandenbrink furious. So instead of simply telling what the supplier should do, he proposed buying them. Three companies would come together to help fund EUV research. Asml, who of course makes the lithography machines Samsung, who's the largest manufacturer of memory chips and tsmc, the world's largest semiconductor foundry. In the partnership, ASML would sell nearly 4 billion euros worth of shares, and they would acquire Cymer for $1.9 billion. With Samsung and TSMC now working directly with ASML, this would knock intel off their feet and an end to America's leadership in chip manufacturing. Meanwhile, around 2013, ASML was burning around 10 million euros per week, still trying to crack the code on EUV. Reflecting on the years of endless development, Vandenbrink stated, it's like your time in the military when you're in the thick of it. It's terrible, but in retrospect, it's the best time of your life. Hijink wrote further on Martin ASML clearly has a leader Martin vandenbrink, CEO might not be on his business card, but he's without a doubt the rock the company relies on. He's the one setting the technical agenda, helping write patents and determining the strategic acquisitions. It is his name that commands respect throughout the entire chip industry, and if one of his plans gets blocked in the boardroom, he'll dig in and stick to it until he gets his way. When it comes down to it, it is clear who has his hand on the wheel. The CEO role at ASML would continuously be put in a really difficult position because the person at the helm was still at the whims of Martin. So in 2013, ASML appointed two President Peter Winink became the President and CEO and Martin vandenbrink became President and Technical Director. As always, the CEO would steer the ship and Martin would set the course. And Winink knew this. He had stated, with Martin, you have the golden ticket in the palm of your hand. Are you really going to mess with that? It wouldn't be until February 2018 that the EUV machines would become fully operational, and they signed with TSMC and Samsung to get them up and running. Intel was being passed by their competitors in Asia on every front and wouldn't start using euv technology until 2023. The rise of TSMC would be a blessing for ASML. Chips that TSMC produced would power Sony's PlayStation, Apple's iPhone, and the graphic chips for Nvidia. In 2022, TSMC supplied more than half of the world's chips and 90% of the most Advanced processors. And although TSMC was thrilled to receive the EUV machines, they were not afraid to speak up when things went wrong, which would really push ASML to continue to innovate year after year. Each mistake would come at a cost in terms of the yield. The machines produced in TSMC absolutely wanted to maximize that yield the best they could. TSMC orders as many machines as they can from ASML because they know that ASML had limited production capacity. And for every machine that was sent to Taiwan, it was one less machine that a competitor could pick up. And ASML has over 4,000 employees in Taiwan assisting the chip manufacturer to ensure that things are running smoothly. These investments for TSMC have certainly paid off as revenues have more than tripled since 2019 and earnings per share has increased by more than four times. They also command a 60% market share in the entire foundry market, making it four times larger than its closest competitor, Samsung. With the rise of tsmc, ASML is highly reliant on them as a customer, as they account for around 40% of ASML's revenue. One would think that a lithography machine with a price tag of hundreds of millions of euros would be able to make perfect copies of chip structures. But the world just isn't so kind. Vandenbrink knew that when he charted out ASML's long term strategy in the late 90s that as chips become smaller, so does the room for error. So at a certain point, software would be a necessary tool to keep producing chips at work. This led ASML to make a handful of acquisitions over the years. One acquisition they made was purchasing Brian in 2006 for $270 million. Bryan is a company headquartered in Silicon Valley that, in layman's terms, develop software that helps correct distortions in the lithography process. Bryan also helped ASML get more exposure to Silicon Valley and hunt for talented software specialists in the United States. Silicon Valley also serves as a hub for AI development. ASML had used AI to understand the interplay in their complex machines, which introduces a mind boggling amount of data and variables at play. Martin Vandenbrink recognizes the potential benefits of machine learning in AI, but he encourages his people to not rely solely on it. He claims that if you rely solely on AI, you're not adding any extra value and you're not doing anything that somebody else can't already do. In part four of the book, it's titled in the Spotlight, Hygiene starts to get into the geopolitical tensions and global technological conflicts between the US and China. Out of the 5.5 billion Internet users globally, about 2/3 of them reside in Asia and 20% of them are in China. Because of this hygiene claims, the technological power is shifting from the west to the East. China is the largest manufacturing hub for electronics globally, which makes it the world's biggest consumer of chips. But with the local chip industry still in its infancy, the country needs to import almost all of its advanced processors, the majority of which come from the U.S. as a result, China has long had aspirations to reduce their dependency on foreigners. China's goal is to be 70% self sufficient in products from 10 strategic sectors by 2025, including the chip. So Chinese chip factories receive capital through national and local investment funds to help stimulate innovation. But within Chinese borders, open criticism of the administration is prohibited, protests are suppressed, their online behavior is analyzed and censored, and the government fails to protect foreign companies against corruption and the theft of their technology. Although America's political parties may be deeply divided, they do agree that China's technological advance is a threat to the free world. And soon this ark rival may be more powerful than America in the field of AI and cyber espionage. So the US is interested in trying to limit the growth of China's chip and technology sector. But the problem is that American chip companies benefit from Chinese sales, so any limitations they pose on China will likely turn to backfire on them. Let's take a quick break and hear from today's sponsors. 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Turn your big business idea into reality with Shopify on your side in thank Me Later. Sign up for your $1 per month trial and start selling today@shopify.com WSB that's shopify.com WSB hey everybody, real quick, I wanted to tell you about a very special event that TIP will be hosting here in late September 2025. We'll be hosting the Investors Podcast Summit in the breathtaking mountains of Big Sky, Montana to bring together like minded people and enjoy great company in one of the most beautiful settings here in the United States. While this could be considered an investment conference, it's likely much different than most investment conferences you've ever been to. Our goal is to create an unforgettable experience for our attendees and help them develop meaningful relationships with like minded members of our audience that will last a lifetime. And what better place to do that than in the serenity of the mountains? We're inviting a select group of 25 attendees who are listeners of this show, many of which will be entrepreneurs, private investors and investment professionals. To learn more about this unforgettable experience, you can go to our website at the investors podcast.com summit, that's theinvestorspodcast.com summit or you can simply click the link in the description below. Alright, back to the show. In May of 2020, after the COVID pandemic, in the light of chip shortages globally, the US Prohibited TSMC from producing advanced chips for Huawei, one of China's leaders in technology. This was enforceable due to Taiwanese use of American tools in their factories, such as design software for chips and chip machines. With TSMC instantly losing one of their biggest customers this sent shock waves to ASML as TSMC immediately scaled back their orders for chip machines. This only exacerbated the chip shortage issue though, as other Chinese companies rushed to buy whatever chips they could, even ordering the less advanced chips, which led to TSMC's order books overflowing. ASML makes no secret of doing business with the whole world. As soon as you walk into the headquarters in Veldhoven, you can see who's interested in a new lithography machine. If South Korean customers are visiting, you'll see a South Korean flag sitting on the reception desk next to the Dutch flag. When Chinese companies visit, a Chinese flag will be waving to welcome them in. With the global rise of China, it's becoming increasingly important to ASML in terms of driving revenue. In fact, in 2024, China accounted for over 1/3 of ASML's sales, which primarily came from selling their older generation machines. ASML tended to avoid politics, but they did have one condition in selling its most advanced machine to China. Under no circumstances should the valuable technology be copied. ASML made it clear that if they see a flagrant infringement of their intellectual property, they would be done doing business. Asml, of course, only does business where it's legally allowed to. And the lithography machines would fall under the Wassener Agreement, which was an agreement put in place by dozens of countries in the 1990s that regulated the export of equipment that could be used for military purposes. This agreement gave the US influence on where lithography machines could be sent, despite ASML being headquartered in the Netherlands. The book gets into an interesting debate of whether the chip industry should be highly regulated or not. ASML would tell you that the chip industry is globally dependent and has complex and vulnerable supply chains and technology. It's an industry that revolves around mutual trust, long term agreements and free market dynamics. And they're supplying machines that power cell phones, usually not military use. But from the US's standpoint, they can make the argument that the chips are used for military use, which may or may not be true. But just as important, they fear the emergence of China becoming the global powerhouse in artificial intelligence. Any excuse to slow China's development of AI could help give the US a leg up in the AI race. As much as ASML would prefer to avoid the geopolitical drama, it's naive to think that they could operate outside of the spotlight forever when their machines print the building blocks of the modern world. Meanwhile, the Dutch government started to change their tone towards China, tending to side more with the US's point of view. In January 2020, the US asked the Netherlands to block EUV exports to China, and the Netherlands agreed to deny ASML the license to sell them to China. Although this might seem like bad news to ASML on the surface, they were still allowed to sell the older generation machines and other players would put their foot on the gas producing chips to try and separate themselves from the Chinese competition. But China's technological advance marched on as SMIC, a foundry based in China, was capable of producing 7 nanometer chips and using the standard scanners from the Netherlands, which was just one or two steps behind those being produced at TSMC with the 4 and 5nm technology. So in October of 2022, the US announced that exporters were no longer allowed to supply tools that would enable Chinese chip makers to produce processors finer than 14 nanometers. Panic would sweep through the chip industry and the stock prices of chip companies like Nvidia, AMD and ASML would fall. ASML certainly had reason to worry. They had over 800 lithography machines operating in chip factories based in China, about half of which are Chinese manufacturers themselves. And then the other half would be companies that aren't based in China. Without maintenance, repairs and spare parts, the most advanced versions would quickly grind to a hole. And ASML had obligations to prevent this from happening to their customers. And they wanted to make good on their word. China even sided with ASML amidst the drama, as top executives from Chinese chip manufacturers emphasized to ASML just how much their production lines relied on them. And they claimed that ASML was just as much a victim through all this as China was. I'm not sure this was entirely the case because businesses like TSMC are quite dynamic. Instead of making chips in China, for example, they can decide to try and make them elsewhere. Of course, this takes years to do, it takes some time. It's at least an option for them. ASML expected that new regulations would actually have no impact on their turnover. In 2023, Huawei would go on to launch a 5G phone with 7 nanometer technology from SMIC, which was proof that China was lagging behind. But it was still not at a standstill due to the US keeping China from getting EUV machines and receiving a limited number of other machines. China would push to try and develop their own alternatives, which from an outsider's perspective, they seem to be successful with doing. As wafers continued to roll out of their production lines. Part of the reason they were able to do this is because they were able to hire former employees of US Companies who brought their knowledge back home. Amec, which was a machine manufacturer in Shanghai, China, even got to the point of supplying chip machines to tsmc. But in the lithography market, ASML was still the go to player. China does have one competing manufacturer of lithography machines which is Shanghai Microelectronics Equipment or SMEE for short. SMEE makes it no secret that it tries to copy the art of lithography directly from ASML. According to HygienCare, SMEE has received financial assistance from the government, but they still remain 15 years behind compared to what ASML has to offer. This goes to show that you can't simply order a lithography machine from ASML and just try to copy it. It requires deep technical knowledge and experience to even know where to begin, yet alone develop cutting edge industry leading technology. Since SME is so far behind in lithography, Chinese chip manufacturers tend to rely on ASML and Nikon for this part of the manufacturing process. However, as the US puts more restrictions in place to limit the imports of lithography machines, this may force China's hand to invest significantly into this area. So SME can catch up to some extent, which would eventually reduce their reliance on ASML and Nikon. Additionally, China has access to two types of rare earth metals that the chip industry relied on the Chinese for, and In July of 2023 they imposed restrictions on exports of these metals. This was a jab from the Chinese to show what could happen if they were further restricted in global trade. And as a result of the increased geopolitical tensions, companies like Apple and Samsung would start to move some of their production outside of China to help diversify their risk exposure. Hygiene then has a chapter here titled It's Raining Billions which gets into the US Government's support to help fuel its own chip industry. In 2022, the US issued the Chips act which provided $52 billion in funding for various programs including R and D manufacturing incentives and workforce development. As I mentioned, chip manufacturing has been dominated by Asia in recent years. So the hope of the CHIPS act was to turn the tide and have more production happen on American soil. Intel saw an opportunity and seized it as they invested $20 billion for expansion in Arizona, claiming $8 billion in subsidies. The US also managed to get a substantial investment from TSMC. Although TSMC preferred to keep the production of their most advanced chips in their own country, they did offer to increase the chip production in the US in exchange for additional guarantees of of military support from the US which they agreed to so in September 2022, the US approved the additional military support of $1.1 billion and TSMC increased its investment in Arizona from 12 billion to 40 billion and included newer production technology. The EU saw a similar need to develop their own chip industry as well, as they accounted for just 8% of global chip production. ASML was called upon to develop a plan for the eu and they're of course in a highly advantageous position as they essentially had a monopoly on the lithography technology. ASML anticipated that demand for chips would double in the coming decade given the chips needed for data centers and the explosion of AI self driving cars and smart electricity networks. So the EU would announce their own chips act which would provide 43 billion euros of stimulus and this led intel to invest another 33 billion euros into European expansion projects. This was a U turn in policy for the EU as they tended to rely on foreigners for chips and other industries. But Covid and the Russian invasion of Ukraine served as a wake up call. If China ever decided to block exports from Taiwan, they would be without needed chips within just two weeks. The final section of the book is titled Growing Pains. To no surprise, ASML isn't just growing, they're exploding. At the headquarters. They have an American style campus which includes a lively restaurant, an auditorium with a rooftop garden, a private supermarket, a bright blue running track and recharge rooms to hang out, read or game. In 2023, ASML had 42,000 employees and was the 50th most valuable company in the world. Their employee count doubled in the past six years and it's expected to double again over the next six years. Analysts predict that the global chip market is going to be a trillion dollar industry by 2030. While most businesses struggle to grow or even just sustain their current business, companies like TSMC and ASML are in the privileged position that they have so much demand for their products and services, they're scrambling to figure out just how to keep up. Just as growing a business is difficult, scaling a business and growing by 15 to 20% year after year is also a big challenge. In 2021, ASML was only able to deliver two thirds of the machines that were ordered for the year. Despite hundreds of new colleagues joining every month, the employee workloads continue to increase. To help grapple with these growing pains, ASML insists on only producing lithography machines and not producing the parts used for those machines. This approach gave ASML the flexibility it needed in its early days, while its Asian competitors insisted on being vertically integrated and oftentimes for the highly complex parts they're buying, they only have one supplier, so a high degree of trust is essential. As a result, the suppliers have effectively become co developers of the machines. Some within ASML believe that they should not tie the fate of their success to a handful of companies and that they should have backup suppliers for all of their most sensitive parts. But throughout the chip industry, the most reliable relationships are built with one trusted partner. Fritz Van Hout has an analogy with regards to this. Think how your spouse might react if you were to have an equally deep relationship with somebody else. As a result, the semiconductor industry is made up of deep but fragile connections, like an incredibly valuable brittle chain. So not only does ASML need to battle growing their production of lithography machines, they rely on many suppliers having the capacity to grow alongside them and adapt to the ruthless ups and downs of the semiconductor industry. Despite the spectacular growth that ASML has had over the years, based on Hyjin's observations, they seem to have done a good job of keeping that startup feel. Thanks to Martin vandenbrink. He's well known in the company for his confrontational approach to business and his tendency to question everything. Because of their unique culture, current employees tend to rise to key managerial positions. One of my favorite lines here from Hijink is ASML is a sprinter forced to run a marathon. I think this quote really shows how ASML just has to operate. They're forced to continue to innovate, launch new things before they're perfect and fix them on the fly. But in the meantime, they're also playing this very long term game. It reminds me a bit about how Tesla operates. At many points in Tesla's history, they were simply fighting to survive and make their shipments that week. But everything they did was still in line with where they wanted to be. Ten years down the line, Van Den Brink is often compared to Apple's founder, Steve Jobs, as they share the same combination of temperament and strategic insight, along with an eye for detail and clever marketing. And just like Steve Jobs, he just does not give his customers exactly what they ask for. He tells them what they need and because of that they just sort of trust him. Since Martin has the most extensive knowledge of the technology, replacing him will require likely a group of people. Because he oversees R and D, intellectual property, engages with discussions with the chip manufacturers, and in his spare moments, he's coming up with new inventions. ASML's culture does have some drawbacks though. Even at its size, they lack the types of efficiencies and standard operating procedures. That you'd find at larger organizations. This can of course, create some redundancies in their typical workflows, which can lead to lower margins from a financial standpoint. And many of their engineers can naturally lack people skills, which oftentimes can make them poor managers once they move up the ranks. Winning tries to lead by example and trying to get, you know, these engineers out of their shells a little bit. Each morning at 7:30 he would have breakfast on the ASML campus, and he would invite anyone to come up and speak with him. The book also gets into some interesting details that aren't so related to the lithography business. For example, ASML is headquartered in Veldhoven, which is just outside of Eindhoven in the Netherlands. Eindhoven has a population of around 250,000 people, and that's pretty small considering that ASML has 44,000 employees globally, and I believe around half of them work at the headquarters or around the headquarters. So they face the challenge of finding and attracting the right talent to come work with them. And the cramped labor market creates friction between ASML and other businesses in the area. Salaries are about 20% higher at ASML than other technology firms, and it's nearly impossible for many to compete with their generous profit sharing and bonus policies. So ASML does a lot of recruiting outside the Netherlands, particularly at foreign universities. They also have the goal of investing at least 100 million euros per year in community projects that also serve their interests. One project they invested in was founding the Junior Academy, which educates elementary students on technology and manufacturing, which the region certainly needs workers for. Given that ASML is so large and they're growing exponentially, and they're based in a relatively less populated area of the world, it's easy to see why finding labor will continue to be a key issue for them just to fill that exponentially growing demand for lithography machines. One thing they're doing to help address these growing pains is to launch satellite offices and these foreign branches in places like Korea and Taiwan. And perhaps down the line they'll also decide to produce lithography machines outside the Netherlands. But so far they haven't taken that step yet. One thing that's been in the back of my mind as I went through the book is just how strong ASML's mode is. It's estimated that ASML has 90% market share in the lithography market, and the ability to replicate their business is just next to impossible. If it were simply an issue of just throwing money at it, then I'm sure, the US or some other country would have done that long ago. And not one single person knows everything there is to know about how these machines actually work. So not even Martin Vandenbrink, and he has over 40 years experience in this industry. Most engineers work on one small component and know everything there is to know about that small piece of the puzzle. As Fritz Van Hout philosophically describes it, the people who know how it should be done don't know why it should be done, and the people who know why it should be done don't know how it should be done. So this dynamic, of course, makes ASML interesting from an investment perspective because it sets the scene for investment returns that are potentially attractive going forward. A number of members of our mastermind community are interested in ASML or have bought shares. And I actually first learned about this incredible business by tuning into a presentation that was done for our community. Thinking about this dynamic also had me think about one of my top holdings in my portfolio, which is Constellation Software. Constellation faces the issue of losing top talent. You know, sometimes highly talented people will go off and start their own firm doing exactly what Constellation does. One of the members of our mastermind community actually started his own serial acquirer after working at Constellation for a few years. And this just is not an issue for asml, because no one or no group of employees is ever going to be able to go out and start their own lithography business, at least to the extent that ASML has. Over the past 40 years, the lines printed on ASML's machines shrunk from a micron to a few nanometers, and that's about a thousand times smaller. And that's a journey that went from the invisible to almost the immeasurable. And Vanden Brink wants to continue to push the limits, pushing for what ASML calls Hyper na. Today, we've seen Moore's Law continue as the number of transistors has continued to double about every two years. But ASML's director of research believes that continued progress is limited by economics and not physics. As Hyjinq puts it here, the chip industry is fast approaching the point where the investments required to scale further down become too large to recoup. That's the real limit. And if chip manufacturers can no longer add value to Hyper NA machines, ASML stands to gain nothing by producing them. In layman's terms, it's getting too expensive, end quote. Nonetheless, VandenBrink is pushing for more innovation and encouraging the chip manufacturers to place orders for upgraded machines that don't even exist yet. And what's impressive about ASML is how they've largely avoided this arrogance and complacency that you tend to see in successful companies or successful people. Despite their dominant position today, they still continue to innovate and push the limits on what others believe is possible. ASML is continuing to bet on increasing the number of transistors per square millimeter, which makes their technology more and more difficult to replicate. The market for lithography machines continues to rapidly grow as orders for new machines continue to roll in. And the old legacy machines are also being upgraded by chip manufacturers. And ASML is not about to let this market slip through their fingers. Turning to the epilogue here, very end of the book, part of the secret to ASML success was their decision to focus on a single product from day one. It allowed the Dutch to just have a merciless pace that their Japanese competitors just could not keep up with. And they had an uncanny ability in working with the chip manufacturers to identify and eliminate issues with the machines, ensuring maximum uptime. And the American competitors failed to accommodate the chip manufacturers in Asia who were pushing for faster production technology. And this played right into ASML's hands, who was looking to innovate and, you know, make that next step forward in the technology available. ASML is the culmination of decades of experimentation and industrialization, and it's built on the legacy of the Philips engineers all the way back in the 1970s. And by relentlessly refining their designs, ASML engineers have ensured their lithography machines kept pace with Moore's Law, constantly pushing the boundaries of performance without reaching a breaking point. It's like a rubber band stretched to its limit, but the rubber band just never is snapping. It hasn't snapped. Their success has hinged on the dual leadership of Martin Vanden Brink and Peter Winink. Van den Brink was relentless on the innovation front, and Winink was really the people person that helped keep VandenBrink in check in managing these relationships with the chip manufacturers. VandenBrink, he retired as President and CTO in April of 2024, but remains active as an advisor to the board. Winning retired as well, wrapping up his tenure as CEO in the same month. Alongside Vanden Brink and Winning, a large group of engineers from the early days are also nearing the end of their tenure at ASML, in their mid to late 60s, if I had to guess. So right now, ASML is sort of at this critical transition point where many key people are stepping away and it's really on them to have train the next generation as you can't learn about this stuff in a manual. Much of it's learned through word of mouth experience and just sheer hard work and time spent with the firm. Their new CEO, Christophe Fouquet. He's a Frenchman who has lived and worked in the Netherlands for 15 years. Now with only one Dutch board member, it's going to be interesting to see how international ASML becomes over time. In the midst of their continued expansion globally, as the world woke up to the importance of chips and how dependent it was on asml, ASML understood the huge responsibility they had as a quasi monopoly. They gave themselves the rule of treating large and small chip manufacturers equally and not overcharging them, which is really saying something given that the EUV lithography machine can run chip makers 300 to $400 million or so. So van den Brink he believed that abusing their monopoly power would actually be their downfall, which is why the decision to restrict sales to Chinese customers was so out of character for them. The Dutch chip machines are intended to serve a global market and enable technological advancement for the common good, and they see making a profit as just a side effect and not the number one goal. So while ASML has a massive lead in the lithography machines today, it remains to be seen whether others will ever be able to catch up. So, for example, China may one day give ASML a run for their money. But for now, ASML is Europe's killer app, a tool that the whole world needs. That's all we have for today's episode. This was a really fun one to put together, so I hope you enjoyed getting a glimpse into one of the most important companies in the world. So with that, thank you for tuning in to today's episode and I hope to see you again next week.
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Host
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