Whatsit Wednesday: Computer Chips

(Being down at camp and enjoying a vist from Sean and Jill in the same days meant I missed posting this tidbit on Wednesday)

The biggest producer of computer chips in the world is Taiwan. To make these chips, these companies need machines that are exclusively built by Dutch company ASML which is headquartered in Veldhoven, the Netherlands. This has made the Dutch quite wealthy, but hit has also created a unique and perhaps dangerous situation in the world. 

ASML was founded in 1984 and makes computer chips. These chips are these days in everything that we use in our modern society. Everyone can understand that chips would be in our smart phones. We use our phones to take pictures, to pay at stores or with friends, to bank, to communicate or even to keep up on our health. But chips are also in our kitchen appliances, radios, clocks, and toys. 

What makes ASML so unique is that they are the only company making the extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) photolithography machines that are necessary for making the most advanced chips used in the world. These machines are used by companies to create the chips which are placed in all of our modern devices. If the machines were not present, the chips could not be made and much of our society would suddenly come to a halt in many ways. 

This is why in recent times these machines have become a political stress point. Most chips are made in Taiwan. Taiwan is considered by China to be part of China, although Taiwan thinks otherwise. China wants the machines that make the chips. The machines are made in the Netherlands but used in Taiwan. So there is pressure to keep these machines out of the hands of China or any other country which some believe might use them to alter the power balance in the world. 

All of this in a little city just about an hour away from where we live. We travel every month to the congregation in Eindhoven (Veldhoven is more or less a suburb of Eindhoven) to sing with the church there, learning new songs and encouraging one another. Eindhoven is the city of lights - the city of Phillips. So it is not strange that ASML would have grown up in this area. 

Small things can often carry quite a bit of weight in the world. The Dutch have always known this and put it into practice. They may be one of the smaller countries in the world (and Europe), but they have quite a bit of power on the world stage.