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What is holding technology back.

The physical bottlenecks under faster compute, power, materials and machines — who makes each, which rule governs it, how sure we are — written down in public.

Worst right now

  1. EUV lithography scannersHow this is computedSum of four judged scores, each 0–3: concentration + substitution + lead time + inelasticity.Method →Code →Verified

    The machines that print the finest circuit patterns. One company on earth builds them.

  2. EUV projection opticsHow this is computedSum of four judged scores, each 0–3: concentration + substitution + lead time + inelasticity.Method →Code →Verified

    The mirrors inside those machines, polished flatter than anything else made. One supplier has ever achieved it.

  3. Advanced packaging capacityHow this is computedSum of four judged scores, each 0–3: concentration + substitution + lead time + inelasticity.Method →Code →Verified

    Assembling several chips into one AI accelerator. How many exist is set here, not at the wafer.

Now · ranked by severity · judged 2026-09-15

Start from what you do

Bottlenecks mapped
How this is computedCount of rows in the bottleneck corpus: every material plus every non-material chokepoint.Method →Code →
How this is computedCount of bottlenecks whose assessed horizon is "now".Method →Code → judged to be binding right now
See them all →
Maker rows sourced
How this is computedProducer rows counted by verification state from the corpus: sourced (an accepted primary source is linked) or unverified (none yet). Unchecked pages: open rows in the producer-sourcing queue, counted live from the database.Method →Code →
How this is computedCount of rows in the market-participant directory.Method →Code → organisations in the directory
What sourced means →
Rules tracked
How this is computedCount of policy instruments in the corpus; each one links its official text.Method →Code →
How this is computedRules counted by the effect recorded on each: "tightens" slows building, "loosens" speeds it; a rule recorded as both ways is counted in neither.Method →Code → slow building, How this is computedRules counted by the effect recorded on each: "tightens" slows building, "loosens" speeds it; a rule recorded as both ways is counted in neither.Method →Code → speed it, How this is computedRules counted by the effect recorded on each: "tightens" slows building, "loosens" speeds it; a rule recorded as both ways is counted in neither.Method →Code → both ways
Read the rules →
Possible fixes
How this is computedCount of science entries: technologies recorded as able to relieve a named bottleneck.Method →Code →
technologies argued to relieve a constraint
See the science →

This map is wrong in places. If you know one of these chains, you can fix it faster than anyone here can, in public and under your own name. Fix a row →

Sweep ran 3h ago · 275 finds waiting to be checked · How fresh is this?