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According to TrendForce's report, Intel will receive an extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography tool with a numerical aperture of 0.55 from ASML this year and will receive most of the company's in 2024. This suggests that Intel tends to use Twinscan EXE machines extensively.

Intel will receive the Twinscan EXE:5000 pilot scanner from ASML this year and will use it to learn how to better utilize it in commercial production of high-NA EUV lithography. Initially, it planned to use this lithography technology on the Intel 18A (18 angstrom, 1.8 nm class) production node to print the smallest details. But as high-NA tools arrived later than expected, it switched to EUV multi-patterning.

The company will acquire six additional high-NA EUV lithography tools (Twinscan EXE:5200) next year, which will be used for mass production of chips with Intel's 18A or other process technologies in 2025 and beyond. Furthermore, the use of Twinscan EXE could positively impact the company's production cycles.

However, given that the cost of these machines will be more expensive than ASML's Twinscan NXE:3600D or NXE:3800E machines, which already cost over $200 million, it is unclear whether they will have a positive impact.

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Intel will gain an advantage over its competitors by pioneering high-NA learning. Moreover, as it is likely to be the first company to move to high-volume production with high-NA tools, its factory tool ecosystem will also adapt to these requirements and will likely evolve into industry standards.

This could give Intel strategic advantages over rivals such as TSMC and Samsung Foundry. But Intel's competitors are also trying to acquire high-NA tools. In this regard, Kyung Kye-hyun, vice president of Samsung Electronics, stated that the company has made an agreement with ASML to supply high-NA tools and said:

Samsung has provided the priority on high-NA equipment technology. I believe this creates an opportunity for us to optimize the use of high-NA technology in our production of DRAM memory chips and logic chips on a long-term basis.