ASML says it sold no lithography tools in Europe in 2026 and calls on the EU to create chip demand

ASML, the Dutch company whose extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography machines are used to build the most advanced chips in the world, has said it sold "absolutely nothing" in Europe in 2026. According to Tom's Hardware, European chipmakers bought none of its lithography equipment this year, and the company is now pressing EU institutions to help build demand for chips made in Europe.

The detail is striking because of who ASML is: the sole producer of EUV systems and, by market value, the largest company in Europe, valued at around $660 billion according to Tom's Hardware. The continent's biggest firm earns effectively none of its money from the continent itself.

The numbers behind the zero

As Tom's Hardware reports, Europe's contribution to ASML's business has slid from about 5% of total profit in 2024 to roughly 1% in 2025, and to almost nothing this year. The reason is blunt: no European chipmaker purchased a lithography system from the company in 2026.

The rest of ASML's customer base tells the opposite story. Its EUV tools go to the small group of foundries and memory makers that run leading-edge fabs — names such as TSMC, Samsung, SK Hynix, Intel and Micron — which are concentrated in East Asia and the United States.

A toolmaker without a home market

EUV lithography is what makes it possible to pattern the finest features on silicon at the most advanced process nodes. Europe, despite hosting the only company that can build these machines, has no high-volume leading-edge logic fab of its own. Its largest chipmakers — Infineon, NXP, STMicroelectronics and Bosch — specialise in automotive, industrial, power and analog chips, which are made on established nodes that do not require EUV tools at all.

Even the headline fab projects attracted to the EU in recent years, such as TSMC's plant in Dresden, are aimed at automotive and industrial chips rather than the leading edge. The result is an unusual split: the machines that define the frontier of chipmaking are engineered in the Netherlands, then shipped almost entirely to Asia and the US.

Demand, not just capacity

ASML's proposed remedy is notable because it is not primarily a plea for factory subsidies. According to Tom's Hardware, the company wants EU authorities to help create demand for European chips — in effect arguing that capacity programmes must be paired with customers who will actually buy advanced silicon produced on the continent.

That points at a gap in the EU's semiconductor strategy to date. The European Chips Act, adopted in 2023, committed tens of billions of euros to expanding chip production in the bloc, with the stated aim of lifting Europe's share of global manufacturing. ASML's zero for 2026 suggests that money has not yet translated into orders for the most advanced equipment — the kind of orders that signal genuine leading-edge capability.

Why it matters

For a continent that has made technological sovereignty a stated priority, the fact that its largest company cannot sell to a single one of its own chipmakers is about as clear a benchmark as exists. Europe holds a chokepoint in the global semiconductor supply chain, yet the value of that position flows to fabs and customers elsewhere.

The numbers also carry a message for EU industrial policy: building fabs is only half the equation. Without anchor demand for advanced chips made in Europe, the bloc risks subsidising capacity that still sits outside the ecosystems — AI accelerators, datacenter processors, flagship mobile silicon — where the most valuable chips are designed and bought.

And for ASML itself, the figures underline a concentration risk of its own. Its fortunes rest on a small set of customers in East Asia and the United States, tying Europe's most valuable company to geopolitical currents far beyond its home market in Veldhoven.