I came to this link via another message board:

https://www.google.com/patents/US8482713?dq=lasers+inassignee:apple&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CEYQ6AEwBmoVChMIm5Le0-6CxwIVipENCh3wBAwj

...and I was half daydreaming when I started reading it (it's an Apple patent to etch glass for their iOs devices), and that's when this question popped into my head.

Since POET has been developing lasers for military use, could those same lasers also be put to use in the process of imaging the circuitry for their own chips? subtracting material from wafers without involving chemicals? in other words, could circuits be cut into (rather than masked onto) the various layers within an Si or GaAs or GaN wafer? Could they make the current imaging equipment and processes obsolete?

My apologies if this question is sophomoric - I don't know all that much about these processes.