TSMC Delays High‑NA Move

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. says it can keep making its most advanced chips without ASML’s newest High-NA tools until about 2029. (electronicsweekly.com) The company gave that timeline on April 23 at its 2026 Technology Symposium, where deputy co-chief operating officer Kevin Zhang said TSMC would keep using current extreme ultraviolet, or EUV, machines for leading-edge production. He said ASML’s High-NA systems are “very, very expensive,” with published estimates putting each tool above €350 million. (electronicsweekly.com) (uk.finance.yahoo.com) TSMC paired that delay with stronger near-term numbers. The company reported first-quarter 2026 revenue of $35.90 billion, gross margin of 66.2%, and guided second-quarter revenue to $39.0 billion to $40.2 billion. (investor.tsmc.com) (cnbc.com) A lithography machine is the factory tool that prints circuit patterns onto silicon, and High-NA is ASML’s newer version with sharper optics for smaller features. TSMC’s decision says its current EUV fleet can still support planned nodes such as A13, which the company says will enter production in 2029. (electronicsweekly.com) That stance puts cost control next to demand growth. Chief executive C.C. Wei said on the April 16 earnings call that AI-related demand remains “extremely robust,” and TSMC raised its full-year 2026 revenue growth outlook to more than 30% in U.S. dollar terms. (cnbc.com) The delay also lands on ASML’s order book. TSMC is ASML’s largest customer by Bloomberg supply-chain data cited in multiple reports, and ASML shares fell about 3.3% after TSMC’s comments became public. (uk.finance.yahoo.com) (bloomberg.com) Analysts did not treat the move as a total surprise. Bernstein said the base case had long been for TSMC to adopt High-NA closer to its A10 generation around 2030, not for A14, according to Investing.com’s report on the reaction. (uk.finance.yahoo.com) TSMC used the same symposium to show where it does plan to spend. It said N2U, an enhanced 2-nanometer variant, is scheduled for 2028, while larger Chip-on-Wafer-on-Substrate packaging and A13 are both slated for 2029. (electronicsweekly.com) Rivals are taking a different route. Intel said in 2024 that it had completed installation of the first commercial High-NA EUV system at its Oregon development fab, and it has tied that equipment to its 14A roadmap. (newsroom.intel.com) For now, TSMC is betting that older EUV tools, fuller factories, and AI chip orders can carry it for several more years. The next test is whether that cheaper path still looks right as 2029 gets closer. (investor.tsmc.com) (electronicsweekly.com)