Fabrication technologies for advanced photomasks with a molybdenum silicide (MoSi) film have been developed by using a variable‐shaped electron‐beam (e‐beam) system. These technologies were applied to the fabrication of 5X reticles for 16M‐bit DRAMs. The variable‐shaped e‐beam system is very effective in increasing the throughput for writing reticles which have a great number of figures, such as 16M‐bit DRAMs. The average writing time was 100 min, which was ∼ (1)/(3) of the time when using a conventional raster‐scan e‐beam system. Photomasks with the MoSi film have advantages in comparison with those with conventional chromium (Cr) film. Pattern defects did not appear during the photomask cleaning because of strong adhesion of the MoSi film to the quartz substrate. Moreover, an accurate feature size on the photomasks was obtained, because the MoSi film was easily dry etched. The feature size accuracy obtained was 0.03 μm in 3σ all over the 5 in. blanks.