ASML Holding NV manufactures the core equipment essential for chip production. Yet what many truly desire is a replica model of one of its machines, built from plastic bricks by an engineer.
Rick Lensen was given a mission: to transform this globally influential machine into a toy.
The world's most critical machine comes from a company you may never have heard of, yet it holds a top-tier market valuation. These extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography systems are vital tools for producing chips for phones, computers, and data centers. Only a few hundred exist worldwide, all produced by the same Dutch firm. However, this technological marvel underpinning the global economy may not even be ASML's most coveted product.
The company has another item that is even harder to obtain than its EUV lithography machines: a LEGO replica of an EUV machine. This collector's set is available exclusively to employees with a verified ASML corporate email address, limited to one set per person, a rule currently enforced very strictly.
While both are scarce, there is a vast difference between the massive chip-making equipment and the children's toy that causes pain when stepped on. The actual EUV machine contains over 100,000 components, while the miniature LEGO version has fewer than 1,000 parts, including a purple lightning piece representing EUV light and a minifigure in a cleanroom suit.
The real machine, composed of high-energy lasers and ultra-precise mirrors, can cost up to $400 million; the version made from colored plastic bricks sells for only about $200. Developing the system now used in chip factories took decades of pioneering research and countless miraculous scientific breakthroughs. Recreating it in LEGO was accomplished by just one person.
The mastermind behind ASML's most unexpected hit product is a data analyst named Rick Lensen—known to some colleagues as "Brick Lensen." A few years ago, Lensen took his young children to a LEGO convention in the Netherlands, sparking a fascination with LEGO and beginning his journey of turning precision equipment into brick models. The 39-year-old father started searching for missing parts of old LEGO sets on a website called BrickLink. Soon after, he began designing his own LEGO sets using software.
His first project was a replica of ASML's campus, even though it meant spending nights and weekends building the place where he worked all day. It took over two years and 2,500 euros of his own money, using approximately 25,000 bricks to create an accurate replica, down to the peregrine falcon in a nest on a roof and a pigeon. "That's its lunch," Lensen joked.
It took nearly another full year to find a place to display his creation on campus. After being turned down by colleagues in the corporate real estate department, Lensen went straight to the top. He created a PowerPoint presentation and emailed then-CEO Peter Wennink on a Friday evening. Wennink replied that same night: he loved the idea.
However, moving the creation presented a typical "ASML problem": just as real EUV machines are so large they require disassembly and three Boeing 747s for transport to customers, Lensen had to take his model apart piece by piece—because the model he built in his attic couldn't fit down the stairs. ASML movers transported the LEGO pieces by truck specifically to the company campus. To this day, visitors to ASML's reception hall are greeted by Lensen's creation.
This was not the last time he combined work and LEGO. Around the time he finished this masterpiece, ASML launched an internal app for navigating its Veldhoven campus. To promote the app and reward beta testers, the company asked Lensen to design a LEGO skyline set of the campus. Subsequently, he was given his next task: turn the world-critical machine into a toy.
In fact, ASML engineer Jeroen Ottens (a former LEGO employee) had previously built a plastic model of an EUV machine. But as ASML launched new models of its flagship product, the company needed a new series of LEGO replica devices—and they already had someone in mind.
Lensen completed the LEGO designs for two high-precision machines in just a few weeks, with one model's instruction manual spanning 61 pages. He was not paid for this work but received one benefit: a free finished set. Meanwhile, thousands of colleagues lined up to purchase this corporate merchandise.
To ASML's Chief Technology Officer, Marco Pieters, these LEGO sets epitomize the engineering spirit—an innate drive to solve complex problems and build precision objects, regardless of the material. Pieters has also taken LEGO sets home to build at the dinner table. Employees working on EUV machines use the bricks to explain their real jobs to their families. Dutch engineers, not known for giving praise lightly, have spoken highly of Lensen's work. A five-star review in the ASML employee store reads: "Looks quite nice."
With such high praise, it's understandable that demand extends far beyond just employees. Cornell University engineering professor Brian Kirby first saw the EUV LEGO model at an ASML technical conference. "As soon as I knew it existed," he said, "I had to have one." At the time, external buyers could still purchase from the company webstore, so he bought one. "I really should have bought two," he regrets.
Subsequently, ASML restricted access to its employee store, canceling all external orders. Yet many LEGO sets still circulate online. In the Netherlands, they appear on the Marktplaats marketplace; on eBay, a boxed EUV LEGO set is listed for $600, while a full ASML LEGO series is priced at $4,500. However, the vast majority of employees would never part with their cherished sets.
Employees have purchased 1,355 units of Lensen's latest lithography machine LEGO version. Meanwhile, ASML has sold only 6 units of the actual machine.
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