Lasertec, a tiny maker of US$40 million chip testing machines, is Japan’s hottest stock thanks to EUV

  • Last month, Lasertec raised its annual order forecast for the second time this year to 85 billion yen (US$789 million) in the period ending June
  • The company’s stock has soared more than 520 per cent since the start of 2019

In March, US chip giant Intel gave Lasertec an award for innovation, its first after decades of doing business together. Photo: Reuters

The list of Intel’s annual supplier award winners tends to read like a who’s-who of the semiconductor industry’s biggest names. This year, it included a little-known Japanese company whose machines have become indispensable in the race to improve semiconductors and whose stock has been rocketing up as a result.

Lasertec is the world’s only maker of testing machines required to verify chip designs for the nascent extreme ultraviolet lithography (or EUV) method of chipmaking. In 2017, Lasertec solved a key piece of the EUV puzzle when it created a machine that can inspect blank EUV masks for internal flaws.

Print option is available for subscribers only.
SUBSCRIBE NOW
Copyright © 2025 South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.