CEO lezing Martin van den Brink ASML

On Wednesday the 12th of November, Martin van den Brink, President and Chief Technology Officer of ASML, spent the day in Twente. He ended the day by giving a lecture in the DesignLab of the university he studied more than 30 years ago. In fact, it was the first time in all those years he returned to the University of Twente to give a lecture, as he normally does not accept invites for lectures, speeches and interviews. The lecture was organized by KIVI Students Twente, in collaboration with the study associations Arago, Astatine and Scintilla, as well as with the MESA+ institute.

Right after he studied applied physics in Enschede and electrical engineering in Arnhem, Martin van den Brink joined ASML in 1984. At the time, ASML was a small start-up of Philips, with 50 people working a “wooden shed”, as moderator Victor van der Chijs put it in his introduction. After this introduction, Martin van den Brink elaborated on the years that followed, explained the fundamentals of ASML’s lithography machines, and introduced the state-of-the-art machinery that the multibillion euro company produces today. Insightful was his comparison in computational power and possibilities between 1984 and today. It made the audience realize how the speaker has not only experienced this growth first-hand, but has also contributed to this progress at the forefront of technology! This comparison came with the insight that one should never be afraid of “exponential curves”, which was the main message of the talk. Martin van den Brink explained very well how, at any point in time, the past looks easy, while the future always looks difficult. Exponential growth should not be feared; it is this type of development which truly offers possibilities for profit and business. He also doesn’t believe in Moore’s law coming to an end soon, as some critics do believe, as he argued there will always be new ways to improve.

What further changed in the course of the last few decades is the fact that big technological discoveries can no longer be accomplished by small teams. Instead, as the systems have become more and more complex, larger and larger collaborations are required. Therefore, he plead for investing in connections, both on organizational level, as on personal level in education.

At the end of the lecture there was some time for the audience to ask questions. Here, Martin van den Brink explained how important he thinks learning pure technical knowledge is, compared to spending too much time on acquiring management and organizational skills. He also thinks that the technical educational programs at the university should always focus on making sure students “get their fundamentals right.” In the end he also shared a great story about a crucial moment in the history of ASML (a story that he also told on the company’s YouTube channel).

At the drinks afterwards, Martin van den Brink stayed quite long to talk some more with the many young people that were present at the event. It is not surprising that many of these conversations were about technical aspects. Some of his employees were present as well, and they also confirmed that, even in the management role that he has, a lot of his meetings are still purely technical, where everyone is welcome, and speaks on the same level and with the same passion. It is this sort of thing that makes that describing Martin van den Brink as an “engineer in every fiber of his being” might still be an understatement.