ASML Locks In Chipmaking's Next Decade: High-NA Alliances, a 20,000-Seat Campus, and a 2028 Output Question

ASML studies output of over 110 EUV systems for 2028, expands its Brainport campus, and keeps buying back shares ahead of October 23 program end.

ASML Holding shares changed hands at EUR 1,509.80 on the day covered by the primary report, a gain of 1.3%, following a 2.2% advance in the prior session that left the stock at EUR 1,491.00. Year-to-date, the Dutch lithography supplier has added 64%, a run that has left little room for bargain hunters but plenty of room for debate about what comes next.

The debate is being settled less by the share chart than by the company's order book and building sites. ASML is simultaneously tying its largest customers to its most advanced tools and pouring concrete for the capacity to serve them.

A 2028 Output Target Takes Shape

According to Reuters, JPMorgan relayed after talks with CFO Roger Dassen that ASML is examining annual production of more than 110 EUV systems for 2028. Management had already signaled it was effectively sold out for 2027, with capacity to build at least 80 units, and is targeting a 30% production increase the following year. Those figures sketch out just how heavy the equipment demands of global chipmakers are likely to remain.

Customers Sign Up for High-NA

The technological commitments underpinning that volume have been arriving from several directions. Intel Foundry reported earlier this month that more than one million wafers have already been processed using High-NA EUV technology. Samsung, for its part, intends to deploy the systems in mass DRAM production from 2028.

On September 7, ahead of the annual industry conference in Monterey, California, ASML and TSMC agreed on a joint initiative to move to 12-inch photomasks. A pilot line is to be built by 2031 under the program, with TSMC targeting full system maturity for advanced manufacturing nodes by 2033. Samsung has joined the same mask-generation industry initiative and is deepening its strategic partnership with ASML in High-NA EUV and advanced manufacturing technologies. For the wider semiconductor industry, these agreements are viewed as an essential building block for pushing miniaturization and performance of future processors and memory chips forward on a predictable schedule.

Ground Broken in Brainport

To handle those volumes, ASML is expanding its physical footprint. On September 8, the first spade went into the ground for a second major industrial campus in the Dutch Brainport region. The site at Brainport Industries Campus North will span roughly 350,000 square meters across multiple phases, with the first section scheduled for completion in 2029 and room for as many as 20,000 jobs. The scale of the build-out makes clear that the company's long-term capacity goals are being translated from paper into steel and concrete.

Buybacks and the Calendar Ahead

Capital discipline runs alongside the industrial expansion. ASML continues to deploy its own liquidity for extensive share repurchases; in the past week alone it bought paper worth double-digit millions every day under the running program, including roughly 43,000 shares for just over EUR 61.5 million on Friday. Such regular purchases signal confidence in the company's own value and provide steady support to the market's supply of stock. The buyback program announced at the start of the year concludes on October 23. Media reports point to the next quarterly figures landing on October 14. Over the past three months, no transactions were recorded among ASML Holding's executives.

With order books full for 2027, a production expansion in the works and deep integration with leading customers, the foundation looks unusually solid. For long-term investors, any market pullbacks are likely to read as opportunities rather than warnings.