Extreme-UV light sources will allow the next generation of lithography equipment to produce circuit features smaller than 0.1 µm -- an improvement by a factor of two over other available advanced optical photolithography processes. This could make microprocessors 100 times more powerful and produce memory chips with 1000 times more capacity, according to TRW.
The company developed the solid-state laser under an agreement with a consortium of semiconductor manufacturers led by Intel, Motorola and Advanced Micro Devices.