Lithography!  It’s not a commonly thought of market, but there’s been a war going on in the midst of it, a good old fashioned corporate turf war.  Seems that current top of the lithography heap, Canon, is trying to fend off a push from Nikon to make a play and get some more market share in here.

The double patterning era is going to be Nikon’s big chance at getting back market share lost to Canon and others, say analysts.  In fact, one analyst in particular, David Motozo Rubenstein with MF Global FXA Securities Ltd. in Tokyo, had this to say:

”We believe that Nikon makes a strong case for a possible market share increase when double patterning steppers begin to ship in the spring of 2010,” he said in a report. ”Nikon claims superior specs in alignment (2.0 nanometer versus 2.5 nm at ASML) and throughput (200 wafers per hour versus 170 at ASML).”

If the analysts say Nikon can handle it, well, it’s a pretty good bet.  But analysts have been wrong before.  So what’s your call?