For a long time, the semiconductor industry's primary economic engine was Moore's Law. An internal benchmark of doubling the number of devices on an integrated chip every 18 months.

Broadly speaking, three engines drove these advances. Semiconductor design, increasing wafer sizes, and lastly, lithography. 

Improvements in optical lithography techniques have been the true driving force behind producing faster and faster chips. But coming up to the new millennium, it became clear to everyone that the lithographic train of progress was braking to a slow halt. 

Was there enough left in the tank for one last ride?