Alternative electron beam technologies to conventional single beam systems have the potential to increase beam current by an order of magnitude, into the 1-10 mu A range. The technique we are investigating is to insert an aperture array at an object plane in a lithography system, thus creating an array of beamlets which are imaged as a dot matrix. Each aperture is surrounded by an independently controlled electrostatic microblanker which can modulate the beamlet passing through the aperture in conjuction with a blanking aperture placed at a crossover further down the column. An existing 20 kV shaped beam column with a LaB6 source providing 5 mu A of illumination current over a 150 mu m x 150 mu m square area is used as a test stand. The column is used to test prototype microblanker chips. Power dissipation calculations show less than a 10 K temperature rise over the prototype chips. Work has begun on a second generation prototype blanker array which will overcome many of the processing difficulties encountered with the first prototype. Specifically, the new all-silicon process will allow fabrication of smaller apertures which require less demagnification and a shorter electron-optical column.