An interview with ASML CEO Christophe Fouquet on the company's 42-year history, its complex supply chains across 2,000 companies, US export bans, AI, and more (Patrick Jenkins/Financial Times)

ASML’s role as the sole supplier of the most advanced chipmaking equipment makes it a strategic choke point for the global semiconductor industry, with direct implications for AI scaling, hardware availability, and national competitiveness. The interview underscores how geopolitical export bans and a supply chain spanning roughly 2,000 companies can disrupt the flow of leading-edge chips, increasing risk for enterprises that depend on timely access to compute and fabrication capacity. For IT organizations, this raises the importance of long-range capacity planning, supplier diversification, and tighter monitoring of semiconductor and AI infrastructure constraints.