Chinese company reportedly building its own DUV chipmaking machines, and that's a really big deal

A Chinese state-backed company has begun mass producing deep ultraviolet lithography machines, reports The Information. That's a big step towards China's semiconductor biz standing on its own two feet.

It takes a complicated lithographic machine to produce a modern chip, and there are two main types: EUV (Extreme Ultraviolet Lithography) and DUV (Deep Ultraviolet Lithography). It's the older of the two, DUV, that a Chinese company is said to have figured out. These sorts of immersion machines are still used for modern computer chips, and today most are made by Dutch company ASML, which took over from the Japanese companies that dominated prior.

Citing people familiar with the matter, The Information says the Chinese DUV machines are set to be delivered to customers this year. Customers including, Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp., Hua Hong Semiconductor, and ChangXin Me...