Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Quantum Middleware

Latest strip published August 30, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

A quantum developer writing code today faces a fragmented hardware landscape. Different quantum processors support different native gate sets, different qubit connectivity, and different error characteristics. Code written for one machine may not run on another. Quantum middleware is the The post Quantum Middleware first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

Japan launches its first operational neutral-atom quantum computer in Aichi Prefecture

Japan’s first neutral-atom quantum computer is now operational in Aichi Prefecture, marking a step forward for the country’s research in advanced computing technologies. Developed by a team including the Institute for Molecular Science and led by Professor Ohmori Kenji, the system uses lasers to confine neutral atoms—atoms with no net electric charge—in a vacuum chamber, enabling quantum computations. Currently, the system is capable of basic calculations, and the research team aims to enhance its stability and scalability for more complex problem-solving in the future.

Read source

D-Wave and Shionogi demonstrate quantum computing enhances drug discovery AI model output

A peer-reviewed study published in Scientific Reports by researchers from D-Wave and Shionogi demonstrates that annealing quantum computing can significantly enhance generative AI models in drug discovery.

Read source

IBM launches Qiskit Fermions, an open-source toolbox for efficient quantum simulation of fermionic systems

IBM has introduced Qiskit Fermions, a modular, open-source toolbox designed for quantum researchers working with fermionic systems such as molecules and materials. The tool allows users to define fermionic operators and circuits, delay fermion-to-qubit mapping until quantum circuit transpilation, and experiment with custom or built-in mappings in their quantum simulation workflows. The package integrates directly into the Qiskit transpiler, connects with tools like ffsim, and aims to facilitate rapid development of new algorithms and domain-specific encodings, streamlining research tasks in quantum chemistry and condensed-matter physics.

Read source

Photonic demonstrates efficient quantum logic with SHYPS QLDPC codes published in Nature Communications

Photonic Inc. has achieved a significant milestone in quantum computing by publishing peer-reviewed research in Nature Communications detailing its SHYPS quantum error correction codes. This breakthrough is only feasible on high-connectivity architectures, such as Photonic’s own Entanglement First system.

Read source

Related coverage: Photonic’s Breakthrough Demonstration of Efficient QLDPC Logic Published in Nature Communications

Princeton University to lead $27.9 million federally funded institute to advance quantum computing hardware

Princeton University has been selected to lead a major new research institute, MARQUIS, as part of an $27.9 million initiative funded by the U.S. The institute’s primary objective is to reinvent the Josephson junction, a key element in superconducting qubits, which has remained largely unchanged for over 25 years but now presents a bottleneck for building larger, functional quantum processors. National Science Foundation to tackle core challenges in quantum computing.

Read source

Related coverage: National Science Foundation renews University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign-led Quantum Leap Challenge Institute for Hybrid Quantum Architectures and Networks with $37.5 million to advance modular quantum computing and workforce training · Cornell University co-founds MARQUIS institute to advance quantum processor fabrication

James Quach and team unveil first working quantum battery prototype that charges faster as it gets larger

Researchers at Australia’s national science agency, Csiro, have developed what they describe as the world’s first working quantum battery prototype. The prototype uses an optical microcavity setup operating at room temperature and stores small amounts of energy for very short periods, on the scale of nanoseconds. While this marks a significant step, real-world applications remain distant, as current designs store insufficient energy for practical use and quantum effects are highly sensitive to environmental disturbance.

Read source

University of California San Diego researchers surpass X-ray energy limit using entangled electrons in helium atoms

Researchers at UC San Diego, in collaboration with TU Wien and the University of Salamanca, have surpassed established theoretical limits for producing high-energy X-rays from atoms using lasers. This observation of double-electron recombination for the first time provides a new method for probing electron correlations, with implications for quantum computing and advanced materials design, as these interactions are foundational to both fields.

Read source

Vietnam sets strategy to build core quantum technology expertise and infrastructure

Vietnam is seeking to elevate its role in quantum technology by moving beyond its current strengths in mathematics, computer science, and supporting roles to develop core expertise in quantum physics and experimental hardware. While the nation benefits from a pool of young talent and has prioritized quantum technology in national policy through Resolution 57, experts assert that significant gaps remain in research infrastructure, laboratory facilities, and university-level programmes dedicated to quantum science. Leading universities such as Phenikaa and research groups like Quantum AI Labs are taking steps to address these challenges, including new training initiatives and international cooperation.

Read source

QuEra Computing deploys AI agent to automate critical quantum computer laser subsystem, accelerating commercial quantum deployments

QuEra Computing has leveraged Anthropic’s Claude AI agent to automate the recovery and control logic for the laser system in its quantum computers, a task previously reliant on expert human intervention. This pilot, conducted as part of the Model Hardware Standard research preview, demonstrated that the AI could recover from complex laser faults autonomously and consistently, reducing downtime from several minutes to seconds and achieving results equal to or better than manual tuning.

Read source

Related coverage: QuEra Computing deploys AI agent to automate laser subsystem recovery in quantum computers, accelerating commercial deployment

Ripple develops quantum-resistant security upgrades for XRP Ledger ahead of anticipated quantum computing threats

Ripple is actively developing security upgrades for the XRP Ledger to defend against anticipated quantum computer threats before the hypothetical milestone known as ‘Q-Day’. Although concrete technical details and completion timelines remain undisclosed, the effort is centered on integrating quantum-resistant cryptographic protocols to secure blockchain transactions against advances in quantum computing. This initiative reflects the growing awareness within the blockchain and cybersecurity communities about vulnerabilities in traditional cryptographic methods if powerful quantum computers are realized.

Read source

Related coverage: XRP analysis: Ripple is preparing XRP Ledger for quantum computers before ‘Q-Day’ arrives

Pasqal and Bleichroeder Acquisition Corp. II complete business combination and announce Nasdaq listing

Pasqal and Bleichroeder Acq Corp II have successfully completed their business combination, resulting in Pasqal becoming a publicly traded company. The firm’s ordinary shares and warrants are set to begin trading on Nasdaq under the symbols ‘PSQL’ and ‘PSQLW’ starting August 28, 2026. The company plans to leverage these funds to accelerate QPU manufacturing, broaden cloud access, integrate with conventional high-performance computing, and scale its operations internationally.

Read source

Bank of America, Wells Fargo and JPMorgan lead in post-quantum cryptography patent filings

Bank of America, Wells Fargo and JPMorgan were among the top filers of patents for quantum-resistant and post-quantum cryptography technology last year, together filing more than 100 as the industry edges closer to the next quantum breakthrough. The filings were among 1,455 patents for technology designed to prevent hackers from using quantum computing to exploit firms, according to intellectual property law firm Mathys & Squire. Benefit from expert analysis, exclusive data and rankings, clear insight into innovation, regulation and strategy, and the context you need to stay ahead of critical developments in global finance.

Read source

United States Treasury Department creates Quantum-Readiness Task Force to coordinate transition to quantum-resistant cryptography in financial sector

The U.S. Treasury Department has announced the formation of the Quantum-Readiness Task Force, a new public-private group aimed at helping the financial sector transition to encryption technologies resistant to quantum computing threats. The initiative will bring together government authorities, banks, infrastructure operators, and technology vendors to coordinate the migration away from cryptographic tools vulnerable to future quantum attacks.

Read source

Canadian government loans Xanadu Quantum $140 million to build Toronto manufacturing plant

Aug 28 (Reuters) - The Canadian government will loan C$195 million ($140.78 million) to Xanadu ​Quantum (XNDU.TO) , opens new tab for setting up a plant that would make photonic components for quantum ‌computers, in the country’s largest ever support for the technology. The move, unveiled on Friday, highlights growing global interest in quantum computers and comes months after the Trump administration decided to ​take $2 billion in equity stakes across nine quantum-computing firms to secure ​U.S. Friday’s ​loan covers the federal portion of up to C$390 million in potential government funding Xanadu announced in March.

Read source

Government of Canada pledges $195 million in repayable funding for Xanadu Quantum Technologies’ new manufacturing facility

The Canadian government has committed $195 million in repayable funding to Xanadu Quantum Technologies for its new advanced manufacturing facility in Toronto, marking the country’s largest single federal investment in quantum technology manufacturing. Xanadu will repurpose a former Campbell’s Soup factory into a 158,000-square-foot hub for producing its room-temperature, photonic quantum computers. The facility is projected to cost $893 million and employ 275 workers, supporting the company as it develops fault-tolerant utility-scale quantum computers.

Read source

MiTale uses IBM quantum computing to generate assets in C.L.A.Y. RPG

MiTale Ltd., a game studio, has partnered with IBM Quantum Computing to use quantum computing techniques in developing C.L.A.Y. MiTale aims to eventually use actual quantum hardware to accelerate complex game development tasks, anticipating that quantum accelerators could one day play a role similar to that of GPUs in PCs.

Read source

The Year Quantum Started Growing Up

Or: why the most important quantum paper of the summer may be about users, not qubits.

Ahoy Pirates. It is August. Half of the quantum world is supposedly on vacation, which apparently means they have more time to publish papers, announce quantum advantage, IPO companies, acquire semiconductor fabs and casually redesign the future of computing. 2026 is not even over, and it already feels like three quantum years wearing a trench coat.

IBM says we have entered the era of trusted quantum advantage. Quantinuum has gone public, raised $1.68 billion and is reporting near-five-nines logical fidelity. IonQ just swallowed a semiconductor foundry. Google, after years of superconducting leadership, decided it also wants neutral atoms. The US government has announced letters of intent totaling roughly $2 billion across nine quantum companies. Post-quantum cryptography timelines are accelerating. And logical qubits—once something mostly found in roadmaps and PowerPoints—are increasingly showing up in actual experiments and product specifications.

Quite a summer.

But buried among all these announcements was a much less glamorous paper: “Know Your Qubits, Know Your Users: Personas for Quantum Software.” No new chip. No new world record. No claim involving more atoms than there are stars in Belgium. Instead, the researchers asked a deceptively simple question:

Who exactly is going to use all these quantum computers?

And I think that question tells us more about where the industry is going than another qubit-count press release.

🏝️ The summer TL;DR

My view of quantum computing in August 2026 is this:

The scientific question is slowly becoming an engineering question.
The engineering question is becoming a product question.
And the product question is becoming a business question.

That does not mean useful fault-tolerant quantum computing has suddenly arrived. It hasn’t. It does mean that several things we have been waiting years to see are happening simultaneously.

Quantum advantage is moving from spectacular demonstrations toward verification and reproducibility. Error correction is becoming an engineering discipline rather than a theoretical prerequisite. Hardware vendors are becoming industrial companies. Quantum machines are moving into HPC and cloud infrastructure. Governments are behaving simultaneously as investors, customers and strategic sponsors. And now researchers have started seriously asking what the software stack should look like for different kinds of users.

Most people using quantum computers will not know they are using quantum computers.

First, what does the study actually say?

The paper comes from researchers at institutions including KIT, TUM, Argonne, TU Delft and others. The researchers used an expert workshop at Dagstuhl in 2024 plus nine semi-structured practitioner interviews conducted at IEEE Quantum Week 2025. From that work they construct what they carefully call a persona hypothesis for quantum software.

This is not a survey of 5,000 Fortune 500 companies asking who intends to buy a quantum computer. The paper is exploratory qualitative research. The interview sample is tiny, drawn heavily from people already inside the quantum ecosystem, selected through convenience sampling, and the interviews were manually documented rather than recorded. The authors themselves explicitly discuss these limitations.

The paper really asks: What different kinds of stakeholders might quantum software need to support? And that is still a fascinating question.

The researchers identify eleven personas:

Application-oriented

• Business user

• Early adopter

• Government contractor

Application + technology oriented

• Simulation-focused engineer

• Researcher

• Physicist

• Chemist

Technology-oriented

• Platform builder

• Quantum algorithm designer

• HPC engineer

• Embedded quantum developer

The distinction between them is not primarily what industry they work in. It is how much of the quantum computer they need to see. And that is the really interesting part.

The Great Quantum Abstraction

Consider two hypothetical users. Alice is designing a new catalyst, she wants to specify molecular structures, constraints and target properties. Alice does not care whether the computation uses 97 trapped ions, 5,000 neutral atoms, an NVIDIA GPU cluster, tensor networks or three hamsters with extraordinarily strong linear algebra skills. What she wants is:

better catalyst → cheaper → faster.

Bob, meanwhile, is building a quantum compiler. Bob cares deeply about topology, gate fidelities, connectivity, error models, compilation strategies, code distances and probably several things Alice would consider reasonable grounds for avoiding him at a cocktail party.

Same machine. Completely different product.

The study describes five abstraction layers ranging from end-user applications down through algorithms, SDKs, compilation and ultimately hardware/system-level interaction. Different personas occupy different parts of that stack. Today almost everyone is forced too far down the stack. Even an application developer frequently needs to understand what hardware is underneath the program.

That is OK. Early computer programmers had to think about registers and memory locations. Early internet programmers had to understand far more networking infrastructure. Early GPU programmers needed intimate knowledge of the hardware. Technologies mature partly by making themselves disappear. And that suggests a wonderfully counterintuitive prediction:

Quantum computing succeeds when quantum computing disappears.

A pharmaceutical company should eventually submit a chemistry problem. An airline should submit an optimization problem. A bank should submit a risk problem. A physicist should submit a Hamiltonian. Something underneath should decide:

CPU?
GPU?
QPU?
If so, which QPU?
Which algorithm?
How much error correction?
How much precision?
At what cost?

And the application should get an answer. That looks suspiciously like... computing.

Quantum advantage became a process, not an announcement

For years quantum advantage worked approximately like this:

1. Quantum company publishes spectacular result.

2. Headlines announce the death of classical computing.

3. Classical-computing researchers drink coffee.

4. Somebody discovers a much better classical algorithm.

5. Everyone moves the goalposts.

6. Repeat.

This was actually healthy. Quantum and classical computation have been pushing each other forward. IBM effectively institutionalized that dynamic with its Quantum Advantage Tracker, where candidate demonstrations are exposed to continuing classical competition rather than being treated as one-time victories. IBM itself describes leading quantum and classical methods as increasingly “neck-and-neck.”

Then July 2026 became particularly interesting. IBM and the University of Chicago reported an experiment involving 70 logical qubits, thousands of logical operations and a roughly 15-minute quantum computation for a problem they argue is beyond practical leading classical simulation. Separate collaborations with Qedma and Algorithmiq tackled quantum materials and molecular calculations.

But the real breakthrough IBM emphasized wasn’t merely beyond classical. It was trust. How can you verify a quantum calculation precisely because the calculation is too difficult to reproduce classically?

Their latest work attempts to build verification into the methodology itself. That is a much more mature conversation and we are moving from “Look! The quantum computer did something impossible!” to: “Here is the workload, here is the evidence, here are the classical competitors, here is how we know the answer is credible.”

That is exactly the transition an industry needs, but don’t confuse this with the finish line. Even IBM researchers still explicitly say they want to see a convincing quantum advantage result in areas such as optimization that survives scrutiny from experts in the classical optimization community, ideally on practically relevant problems.

So my scoreboard remains:

Scientific quantum advantage: increasingly credible.
Useful quantum advantage: emerging candidates.
Economic quantum advantage: not demonstrated at meaningful industrial scale yet.

Three very different things. Please do not put them in the same PowerPoint box.

Error correction stopped being a footnote

For most of the last decade, every quantum presentation had essentially the same ending:

“…and eventually we will have error correction.”

2026 feels different. We are increasingly discussing how good the logical computation is, how efficiently logical qubits can be encoded, what codes work for particular architectures and how decoding fits into the runtime.

Quantinuum’s Helios has 98 fully connected physical qubits and has demonstrated different logical configurations, while the company now reports near-five-nines logical fidelity using newer error-correcting approaches.

Google has been working not only on below-threshold surface-code error correction but, in 2026, on systems that dynamically adapt their error-correction controls using reinforcement learning to compensate for hardware drift during long computations.

Atom Computing reported repeated syndrome-extraction cycles for a toric code using neutral atoms, including replacement of lost atoms and reservoir reloading, a very practical engineering problem if you expect computations to continue for long periods.

Alice & Bob, meanwhile, unveiled an entire system architecture engineered around cat qubits and quantum error correction rather than simply offering another experimental chip.

This doesn’t mean fault tolerance is solved, far from it. But QEC is becoming architecture. And once error correction becomes architecture rather than aspiration, software suddenly matters much more.

Which takes us straight back to our eleven users.

The hardware race somehow became more interesting

Another big lesson from 2026: Anyone confidently telling you which qubit modality won should perhaps spend less time on LinkedIn.

Superconducting
Trapped ions
Neutral atoms
Photonic systems
Cat qubits
Annealers

Several architectures continue making credible progress but perhaps the funniest signal came from Google. They helped define modern superconducting quantum computing. Willow produced one of the field’s most important error-correction demonstrations, yet in March Google announced that Google Quantum AI would also pursue neutral-atom quantum computing. D-Wave pioneered the annealing device, before anybody else, yet they are (since ever) about to release their gate based device.

That is not necessarily an admission that superconducting qubits have lost. It is an admission that this game is absolutely not over.

Neutral atoms in particular are progressing quickly. QuEra is targeting fault-tolerant systems for 2028 and publishing architectures focused on very high logical operation counts, while Atom Computing and others continue pushing logical-QEC experiments.

Meanwhile Rigetti’s Cepheus system uses twelve interconnected chiplets to form a 108-qubit superconducting system—another reminder that quantum scaling is increasingly becoming a packaging, interconnect and manufacturing problem rather than just a physics problem.

Different physical approaches may ultimately optimize different sections of the quantum workload landscape. That sounds familiar too, we don’t ask whether CPU or GPU “won computing”. They simply became different processors.

The industry acquired something extremely important: an industrial base

Perhaps the biggest change of 2026 hasn’t happened inside a dilution refrigerator, but on balance sheets. Quantinuum completed a traditional IPO in June, raising approximately $1.68 billion.

IonQ reported $80.1 million of Q2 revenue, up 287% year-over-year, and completed its acquisition of SkyWater Technology, giving IonQ direct access to US semiconductor manufacturing infrastructure.

The US Department of Commerce announced letters of intent for roughly $2 billion in planned funding involving nine quantum companies, including D-Wave, Infleqtion, PsiQuantum, Quantinuum and Rigetti, with the government expected to receive minority non-controlling equity stakes under the proposed agreements.

D-Wave says first-half bookings reached $35.5 million, although first-half revenue remained only $5.9 million.

And therein lies our giant quantum elephant. There is enormous capital, there is increasingly serious engineering. Customer exists, and there are even production workloads in some niches (not necessarily better than classical counterparts).

But commercial revenue remains minuscule compared with the capital being invested and the valuations being assigned. That gap still matters a lot.

2026 proves there is a quantum industry.. It does not yet prove the economics of that industry.

Quantum is becoming a data-center component

This may be the biggest long-term strategic shift. For years we talked about “accessing a quantum computer”. But that phrase will eventually sound as strange. as it would be saying “Today I accessed a GPU computer”

The GPU is part of an infrastructure stack. Quantinuum and Oracle recently announced plans to place Helios inside Oracle Cloud Infrastructure, alongside conventional compute, networking, storage and AI infrastructure. Quantinuum is also working with HPE around hybrid quantum/HPC environments.

QuEra is expanding its relationship with AWS around future fault-tolerant neutral-atom machines. And this maps beautifully onto perhaps the most underrated persona in the paper:

The HPC engineer.

Because the quantum computer is unlikely to replace the supercomputer, it will probably become another accelerator attached to it: CPU + GPU + QPU.

Data moves between them. Schedulers decide where computation goes. Compilers decompose workloads. Classical machines perform preprocessing and post-processing. GPUs decode error-correcting codes. QPUs perform very specific computational kernels. Success. Like an armada of Man-o-war’s and skippers working together.

Suddenly quantum computing begins to look less like a replacement for classical computing…a nd more like the next phase of heterogeneous computing.

And I think the paper is missing the most important user

Here is where I would extend the authors’ model. The study has eleven personas but there will be a twelfth and it may eventually become the biggest one: The AI agent.

We naturally imagine humans writing quantum software because that is how software works today. But consider the timeline: Useful fault-tolerant quantum computing will mature at exactly the same time that software development itself is being transformed by AI.

So why should a chemist learn a quantum DSL?
Why should a financial analyst understand amplitude estimation?
Why should an engineer decide how to map a workload onto a specific QPU?

An AI system can potentially understand the domain problem, generate candidate algorithms, estimate quantum resources, simulate smaller instances, select hardware, compile the circuit, submit jobs, evaluate the result against classical alternatives and iterate.

Humans express intent, agents navigate the abstraction layers and the quantum computer sits underneath together with the other useful tools. This doesn’t eliminate quantum expertise but expands it. Experts will build the compilers, verification methods, algorithms, error-correction stacks and system architectures the agents use. And it could dramatically change the size of each persona group.

Perhaps there won’t be millions of quantum programmers. But maybe there will be millions of programmers whose agents sometimes generate quantum computations.

That would be a much bigger market.

The quantum industry of 2030 may look very different

If you take everything above seriously, several parts of today’s ecosystem probably change.

Pure hardware companies become rarer.

Building a QPU is a very capital-intensive exercise in manufacturing, packaging, electronics, cryogenics/optics, control systems, networking and software. Expect vertical integration, acquisitions and partnerships. IonQ buying SkyWater is a particularly aggressive example.

The hyperscalers become increasingly powerful distributors.

Customers will not want twelve independent quantum accounts. They will want quantum integrated into infrastructure they already use with identity, governance, data, HPC and GPU integrations, billing, schedulers and APIs.

This favors cloud and infrastructure ecosystems. But also data platforms.

Quantum, very much like AI, will need data. If you don’t run your ML algorithms in isolation… why would you do it with quantum algorithms?

Application value moves upward.

Chemistry, materials, drug discovery, energy, industrial simulation, security and any kind of optimization. Companies that own important domain workflows and proprietary data may capture more economic value than companies offering generic circuit-development environments.

Benchmarking becomes infrastructure.

Quantum advantage cannot depend forever on which company’s marketing department has the largest thesaurus. Verification, reproducible workloads, resource estimation and credible quantum-vs-classical benchmarking will become part of procurement.

IBM’s Advantage Tracker points in exactly this direction.

Quantum advantage becomes plural.

There probably won’t be one morning when CNBC announces:

QUANTUM COMPUTERS NOW USEFUL. CLASSICAL COMPUTERS TO BE DISCONTINUED FRIDAY.

Instead we will get advantage for particular workloads. Simulation, sampling, optimization, etc. Or eventual economic advantage for specific industrial processes. The frontier moves workload by workload.

Meanwhile, the first giant quantum market may have nothing to do with running quantum algorithms

There is another wonderfully ironic part of this story. One of the first enormous commercial consequences of quantum computing is likely to be:

Replacing cryptography before large quantum computers exist.

Google moved its own target for post-quantum cryptographic migration to 2029, explicitly citing progress in hardware, error correction and factoring resource estimates. Google Cloud reiterated that roadmap this month.

NIST now tells organizations to begin migrating to standardized PQC, while the UK’s NCSC recommends discovery and migration planning by 2028, high-priority migrations by 2031 and broad completion by 2035.

Google researchers have also published updated resource estimates for attacking elliptic-curve cryptography involving fewer than roughly 1,500 logical qubits under their circuit assumptions.

Nobody should translate that directly into “Bitcoin dies Tuesday”. Hardware requirements remain enormous but boardrooms do not need certainty, they need risk times migration time.

Replacing cryptography across banks, governments, telecom networks, embedded systems, cars and industrial infrastructure takes years, so quantum computing is therefore already creating very real IT spending without having broken RSA once. That is quite an achievement.

My updated predictions

Based on where we stand in summer 2026:

1. We will stop measuring progress primarily in physical qubits. - Logical operations, logical fidelity, circuit depth, runtime, resource efficiency and ultimately application performance become far more important.

2. There will never be a single “quantum advantage moment.” -There will be dozens of them, followed by classical counterattacks. This is good science.

3. The first economically meaningful advantages will probably appear in scientific workloads before broad enterprise optimization. - Quantum simulation remains the most natural fit between the physics of the machine and the problem being solved.

4. Quantum systems will become part of HPC architecture before they become general-purpose computers. - Think accelerator, not replacement.

5. AI will dramatically reduce the quantum skills barrier. - The interface to quantum computing may eventually be an agent rather than Qiskit.

6. Error correction and verification become products. - Not academic appendices. Products.

7. We will see are seeing consolidation. - The amount of capital required to build competitive machines is increasing dramatically. Not every current hardware company survives independently.

8. Post-quantum security becomes mainstream enterprise infrastructure before fault-tolerant quantum applications become mainstream. - That transition is already underway.

9. The winning companies stop selling qubits - They sell chemistry calculations, simulations, optimization, security, compute services and outcomes.

And finally:

The biggest sign that quantum computing has succeeded will be when nobody cares that it is quantum.

That is why I find this strange little persona paper so interesting. After twenty years of asking how many qubits we can build, how clean the gates can become and whether quantum computers can outperform classical machines... we have started asking:

Who is the user?

That sounds mundane but it isn’t. Industries begin with technology. They grow up when they discover customers.

And now, for the Weekly!

IBM took a concrete step toward real scalability, rolling out a modular cryogenic architecture that promises more robust wiring, greater processor size, and lower thermal interference. Essentials for assembling multi-chip systems with thousands of qubits. Early results show two prototype cells running in tandem, but fault-tolerant hardware remains years out, with Starling slated for 2029. Meanwhile, the underlying tech arms race is still wide open. Recent work highlights Caltech’s feat with 6,100 trapped cesium atoms. The common refrain: impressive prototypes everywhere, but no clear winner or a machine ready for large-scale practical algorithms yet. Industry is sprinting to match that ambition with capital. Quantum unicorns are multiplying: company valuations over $1 billion have doubled in a single year, with software-first players like Multiverse Computing now valued at $2.28 billion and venture investment at record highs. The Company Lab joined the push with a year-long program, CO.LAB Q, designed to drag quantum inventions out of the lab and into energy, mobility, and defense use cases, sounding the call for more practical applications rooted in Tennessee’s research strengths. At the policy level, U.S. federal agencies such as the Department of Energy and the Department of the Navy are past the “what if” stage, deploying initial quantum projects by leaning on cloud access rather than building on-premise assets. Bottom line: the science keeps ticking forward, investors are flush with confidence (and cash), and government demand is materializing, but real commercial quantum advantage is still an aspiration. The hype is strong, but the signal is unmistakable: hardware, infrastructure, and executional proof remain the real gates to unlock.

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Quantum Compiler

Latest strip published August 23, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

A quantum compiler translates a quantum algorithm, expressed as a sequence of abstract gates, into a form that specific quantum hardware can execute. This translation involves several steps, each addressing a different mismatch between what the algorithm assumes and what The post Quantum Compiler first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

Wolfgang Mauerer and colleagues find most quantum computing research papers cannot be reproduced

This may undermine the credibility of some of the achievements that the quantum computing industry has reported in recent years, kicking off a replication crisis in the fast-growing field. With quantum computing hardware improving rapidly in recent years, researchers across the globe are exploring myriad use cases, from simulating molecules to optimising airline logistics. Wolfgang Mauerer at the Technical University of Applied Sciences Regensburg in Germany and his colleagues have now evaluated thousands of scientific papers on quantum computing and found that, currently, most can’t be reproduced.

Read source

Valla Fatemi’s team uses krypton gas to reduce tantalum deposition temperature for improved quantum computing materials

Cornell researchers, led by Valla Fatemi, have developed a method that uses krypton gas to deposit tantalum thin films at significantly lower temperatures—200°C instead of above 400°C—on silicon substrates, a breakthrough for superconducting quantum computing components. Tantalum, prized for its stability and corrosion resistance, has been challenging to manufacture at scale due to its high deposition temperature, which is incompatible with most semiconductor foundries’ equipment.

Read source

IBM unveils modular cryogenic architecture to enable scalable, interconnected quantum processors

IBM has introduced a new modular cryogenic architecture designed to improve the scalability and reliability of quantum computing systems. These modular cells are significantly larger than previous solutions, supporting greater wiring capacity and larger processors while keeping thermal interactions minimal and performance stable. This modular method is a foundational step towards IBM’s goal of building fault-tolerant, multi-chip quantum systems capable of thousands of qubits, allowing researchers to test critical hardware components ahead of the anticipated IBM Quantum Starling in 2029. IBM has already demonstrated success by coupling two prototype cryogenic cells in its Poughkeepsie facility.

Read source

Researchers advance diverse quantum computer designs using fragile qubits in atoms and superconducting circuits

Scaling prototypes to machines with tens of thousands or millions of reliable qubits is described as a central obstacle. The article also reviews recent milestones such as Caltech’s trapping of 6,100 cesium atoms and IBM’s production of chips with 120 superconducting qubits, while noting that quantum computers capable of running large-scale algorithms are still in development. Progress is evident, but the field has yet to settle on a definitive technology.

Read source

FAMU-FSU College of Engineering researchers develop chip design for magnetically levitated electron-on-neon qubits

Researchers at the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering, in collaboration with the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory, have introduced a new quantum computing architecture that employs magnetic levitation for electron-on-neon qubits. The team plans to build a working prototype, leveraging existing chip fabrication techniques to accelerate the transition from theory to practice.

Read source

Kevin Corella evaluates Quantum Portfolio Management as a diagnostic architecture for constrained decision systems

A study on Quantum Portfolio Management (QPM) evaluated a simplified architecture for decision-making under constraints using projected dynamical systems. The framework distinguished between desired actions, executable movements, and constraint interactions, adding diagnostics like Coherence Debt, Constraint Pressure, and model-based Margin. Analysis using historical replay data, explicit benchmarks, and pre-specified hypotheses found that QPM did not serve as a unique execution method or deliver superior financial outcomes within the specified conditions. These findings suggest QPM should be understood primarily as an auditable diagnostic tool, and mark the first formal test stage in the QPM research agenda.

Read source

Researchers identify eleven user personas for quantum software through expert focus groups and practitioner interviews

Researchers have conducted a detailed stakeholder analysis to generate personas that reflect the diverse users of quantum software. This persona-based approach is intended to inform the design of user-centered quantum software by aligning language, abstraction, and interface decisions with the actual needs of various stakeholders in quantum computing.

Read source

The Company Lab launches CO.LAB Q commercialization studio to support quantum startups

The Company Lab has launched CO.LAB Q, a 12-month quantum commercialization studio designed to help startups and research teams translate advanced quantum technologies into market-ready businesses. Applications are now open, and the program, beginning in November, will offer individualized commercialization support, access to quantum infrastructure, technical guidance, and pathways to capital. CO.LAB Q is focused on moving quantum breakthroughs from lab to practical solutions in fields such as energy, mobility, logistics, and defense, leveraging the Tennessee Valley’s existing strengths and research partnerships.

Read source

NTT DOCOMO deploys second D-Wave-powered quantum application to reduce network signaling load

NTT DOCOMO has put a second D-Wave-powered quantum computing application into production, targeting network operations optimization. For a real-world case, the quantum solution completed an optimization spanning 333 base stations in about five minutes, and the outcomes are now part of DOCOMO’s day-to-day operations.

Read source

Number of quantum computing companies valued over $1 billion doubles to twelve as capital investment surges in 2026

The quantum technology sector has seen a notable surge in billion-dollar company valuations, with the number of ‘quantum unicorns’ growing from about six at the end of 2025 to twelve in 2026, and at least three more significant deals announced. This expansion spans various quantum hardware modalities and now includes software-focused firms like Multiverse Computing, which reached a $2.28 billion post-money valuation without building quantum computers, instead offering advanced quantum-inspired algorithms and AI model compression. Venture funding in quantum computing is at record highs, with $3.9 billion invested in 2025 and nearly half of the past decade’s capital deployed in the last 18 months, signaling strong investor confidence and longer development runways.

Read source

Department of Energy, Department of the Navy, and Federal Aviation Administration implement quantum computing projects and infrastructure planning

Quantum computing is already making inroads at several federal agencies, moving beyond theoretical planning into practical projects. The Department of Energy has launched the Quantum Genesis initiative aimed at establishing a fault-tolerant quantum computing resource, while the Department of the Navy is exploring quantum approaches to complex logistical and supply chain challenges. The technology is typically accessed through cloud environments, as most agencies lack onsite quantum infrastructure, highlighting that successful adoption depends on robust networking, throughput, and IT connectivity.

Read source

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Optical Tweezers

Latest strip published August 16, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

Neutral-atom quantum computers use individual uncharged atoms as qubits. Because these atoms carry no net electric charge, they do not repel each other, allowing researchers to pack large numbers of qubits into dense, configurable arrays. Individual atoms are trapped using The post Optical Tweezers first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

Q-CTRL researchers execute 100-qubit Quantum Fourier Transform on IBM quantum hardware

Q-CTRL researchers have successfully executed a 100-qubit Quantum Fourier Transform (QFT) on IBM’s quantum hardware, doubling the previous record for experimental QFT implementations. This achievement demonstrates that sophisticated quantum algorithm components can function effectively at much larger scales than before, suggesting that meaningful computation is becoming feasible on current-generation quantum devices.

Read source

[PAPER] Brazilian quantum researchers target sovereignty with R$69 million bet on software, sensing, and metrology—domestic cesium fountain clock marks technical stride, imported parts underscore lingering hardware gap

Brazil’s quantum strategy is clear: skip the arms race for headline-grabbing quantum hardware and double down on software, sensing, and metrology, where brains matter more than billion-dollar fabs. The country’s R$69 million (about US $14 million) in public investment is a rounding error compared to U.S. And Chinese budgets, but it’s being steered toward quantum software, communications, and enabling technologies like atomic clocks and sensors.

Read source

Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Solid State Physics researchers propose realistic benchmarks for quantum advantage using open-system approaches

Recent research has challenged conventional approaches to quantum advantage by introducing more realistic benchmarks for quantum algorithms, particularly in quantum chemistry. A review published on arXiv by a consortium including HQS Quantum Simulations, ETH Zurich, and Fraunhofer IAF argues that quantum algorithms should model open-system dynamics—where molecules interact with their environment—instead of the traditional focus on idealized, closed systems. Another study from Fraunhofer IAF, published in Physical Review A, demonstrates that evaluating how quantum algorithms like the Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm scale with problem size is crucial for assessing practical quantum advantage.

Read source

Honda Motor Co. leads investment in quantum computing startup Quemix to accelerate next-generation battery materials development

Honda has led an early-stage investment round in Quemix, a Tokyo-based quantum computing startup, to accelerate the development of next-generation battery materials. This follows prior joint research between the two companies: in May 2025 they co-developed technology for reading quantum states, and by June 2026 created a quantum algorithm to speed up density functional theory calculations, a key approach in materials science. The investment is channeled through Honda Xcelerator Ventures and aligns with Honda’s carbon-neutrality goals.

Read source

Quantinuum and Oracle announce partnership to provide Helios quantum computer access on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure

Quantinuum and Oracle have formed a multi-year partnership to integrate Quantinuum’s latest Helios quantum computer with Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI), aiming to support enterprise, research, and academic workloads in fields such as drug discovery, materials science, and financial modeling. Helios, a 98-physical-qubit trapped-ion system, will be deployed in a US-based OCI AI data center, providing direct, managed access to quantum computing within Oracle’s existing cloud services. The collaboration is designed to enable hybrid quantum-AI workloads, reduce energy consumption compared to traditional supercomputers, and simplify the adoption of quantum resources through seamless integration with OCI’s classical and AI environments.

Read source

Related coverage: Qunnect and Monarch Quantum announce partnership to commercialize deployable quantum networking infrastructure · Quanta Computer and Quantinuum enter partnership to co-develop infrastructure for large-scale quantum computing

Pasqal demonstrates on-chip qubit control using photonic integrated circuits

Pasqal announced a technological milestone in neutral-atom quantum computing by successfully trapping individual atoms using laser light from a photonic integrated circuit (PIC). This integrated approach aims to reduce the optical footprint of future processors by up to 50 times, enabling pathways toward large-scale, fault-tolerant quantum computers supporting more than 10,000 atoms and 100 logical qubits. This feat, developed in partnership with Aeponyx, involved generating four optical traps through a single chip to hold four individual rubidium atoms within a quantum processing unit.

Read source

GSMA and QCentroid launch Quantum Computing Implementation Playbook and Discovery Sandbox for telecommunications operators

GSMA and QCentroid have introduced the Quantum Computing Implementation Playbook for Telco Operators, aiming to guide telecom companies from awareness to practical quantum adoption. To support practical experimentation, GSMA and QCentroid are launching the Discovery Sandbox, offering accelerated and standard tracks where operators can test quantum applications, gain experience, and develop informed strategies. These initiatives are designed to help telco operators navigate early-stage quantum experimentation and readiness for future deployment.

Read source

Governor Kathy Hochul launches $60 million initiative to establish regional quantum commercialization hubs in New York

New York State has launched a $60 million competition to establish up to four Regional Quantum Technology Commercialization Hubs, each eligible for up to $15 million, aiming to bridge the gap between quantum research and commercial deployment. The hubs will provide shared lab infrastructure, mentorship, and industry networks for early-stage companies, with applications due by October 2026. Announced by Governor Kathy Hochul, the initiative targets the so-called ‘Valley of Death’ where quantum startups often fail due to high infrastructure costs and lack of commercial traction despite scientific breakthroughs.

Read source

Tamil Nadu signs agreements with four quantum computing companies to establish local operations

Tamil Nadu has formalized agreements with four quantum technology ventures as part of its strategy to establish a strong presence in the rapidly developing quantum computing sector. At the Vetri Tamil Nadu Investment Conclave 2026, the state signed memoranda of understanding with Quantum Integrated Machines—which will set up a major operation in Chengalpet in collaboration with the Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research—and Chennai-based Quntrolsphere, which will focus on quantum control hardware. TriQuanta Labs is expanding its hybrid quantum computing R&D and engineering operations to Chennai, building on its existing bases in Hyderabad and Amaravathi.

Read source

Hefei Sizhen Chip Technology raises over 100 million yuan in Series B funding for silicon-photonic quantum computing systems

Hefei Sizhen Chip Technology, operating as Silicon Quantum Chips, has secured over 100 million yuan (approximately $14.8 million) in Series B funding to advance its silicon-photonic quantum computing technology. Founded in 2020 and rooted in research from the University of Science and Technology of China, the company is developing both core quantum devices and full computing systems. The new investment will fuel research and development on 10,000-bit optical computing clusters and general-purpose quantum chipsets, with plans for a 5,000-bit product launch by 2026. The round was co-led by Goertek and Weihao Core Semiconductor, with additional support from several venture capital and local government-affiliated funds.

Read source

Saxon Q unveils portable diamond-powered quantum computer operating at room temperature and standard wall outlet

German startup Saxon Q has introduced what it claims is the world’s first portable diamond-powered quantum computer able to operate at room temperature without the need for cryogenic cooling, advancing accessibility in quantum computing. The device fits into a standard server rack and plugs into a conventional wall outlet, supporting up to 128 qubits, with plans for a 512-qubit system next year and ambitions to surpass 10,000 qubits after 2030. Unlike traditional quantum machines, it uses nitrogen-vacancy centers in synthetic diamonds as qubits, enhanced by sulfur co-implantation to improve qubit stability and control, reportedly reaching single-qubit fidelity of 99.98%.

Read source

Lastly, if you happen to speak spanish (and I know many of you do!) This satirical / realistic video that typically touches on economy and markets has tackled quantum this week, with monkeys. And explains very well the situation witht the current publicly listed quantum companies.

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Bit Flips

Latest strip published August 9, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

Quantum computers experience several distinct types of errors, each corrupting quantum information in a different way. A bit-flip error swaps a qubit’s state, turning |0⟩ into |1⟩ or vice versa. This is the quantum analog of a classical bit error The post Bit Flips first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

Amazon Web Services and JPMorganChase jointly develop new hybrid quantum algorithms and toolkits for financial optimization problems

AWS and JPMorganChase have established an ongoing research partnership aimed at advancing quantum computing applications for complex optimization problems in finance and industry. Their collaboration has produced a suite of quantum and hybrid algorithms, including a decomposition pipeline that reduces portfolio optimization problems by about 80%, enabling execution on today’s quantum hardware, and a compilation toolkit capable of shrinking qubit requirements for large graph problems by several orders of magnitude. Notably, the qReduMIS hybrid algorithm, using quantum devices as co-processors, achieved over 89% average success rates on challenging problem instances tested with QuEra’s Aquila device via Amazon Braket.

Read source

Cleveland Clinic and IBM researchers develop quantum machine learning framework to predict immune response to neoantigens

Researchers from Cleveland Clinic and IBM have developed a quantum machine learning framework, Q-CHIPP, aimed at improving the prediction of which tumor neoantigens will stimulate the immune system. This approach, which leverages quantum convolutional neural networks, was shown to outperform traditional computational methods, especially under conditions with limited data, according to findings published in Science Advances. The team plans to further refine this model to enhance identification of therapeutic targets, potentially accelerating the development of personalized cancer immunotherapies and next-generation vaccines.

Read source

Marcus Albrechtsen and collaborators achieve telecom-band single-photon emission from quantum dots at 1300 nm with 40 million photons per second

Researchers from the Niels Bohr Institute, Ruhr University Bochum, the University of Basel, and Sparrow Quantum have developed waveguide-integrated quantum dots that emit over 40 million single photons per second directly in the ‘O-band’ telecom range (1260–1360 nm), with a linewidth only 8% broader than the transform limit.

Read source

[PAPER] Yale researchers push cavity qubit entangling gate to 500 nanoseconds—self-flags 0.5% erasure errors, Pauli errors below 0.1%—surface code simulations confirm logical gains over generic noise

The main result here is a two-qubit entangling gate for dual-rail cavity qubits that not only operates quickly (about 500 nanoseconds) but also flags its own errors as detectable photon losses, with erasure rates around 0.5% per gate and residual Pauli errors below 0.1%. The strongest evidence comes from repeated gate benchmarking: after post-selecting erasures, the per-gate infidelity is just 0.029%, and bit-flip errors are suppressed to the 10⁻⁶ level. The real punchline is that this error structure—dominated by detectable erasures and dephasing—lets error correction codes tolerate higher fault rates and simplifies syndrome extraction, as confirmed by surface code simulations showing logical error suppression well beyond standard depolarizing noise models.

Read source

Related coverage: D-Wave Quantum Inc. demonstrates two-qubit entangling gate achieving efficient quantum error correction with reduced hardware overhead · Two-qubit entangling gate flags its own errors as detectable photon losses

MIT-led team develops air-stable, ultrathin niobium diselenide superconductors for scalable quantum devices

Researchers at MIT and collaborating institutions have developed a method to produce air-stable, ultrathin superconducting films by growing niobium diselenide beneath a protective graphene layer.

Read source

Eaton awarded $7 million Air Force contract to apply quantum computing for power grid security

Eaton has secured a $7 million, 24-month contract from the US Air Force Research Laboratory to develop quantum computing applications aimed at bolstering electric grid resilience and security. Eaton will collaborate with Infleqtion, contributing specialized quantum hardware, and Pennsylvania State University, supporting machine learning and artificial intelligence elements. The project’s focus includes optimizing new quantum algorithms and circuits, running experiments on diverse quantum hardware, and demonstrating how these advances can help address complex contingency planning challenges in grid management.

Read source

QuiX Quantum announces commercial launch of Alquor 2.0 rack-mountable quantum photonic processor platform

QuiX Quantum has launched Alquor 2.0, its updated, rack-mountable quantum photonic processor platform, aimed at streamlining photonic quantum research by moving away from complex optical table setups. Research teams can now conduct experiments with reduced operational burden through a programmable, reproducible processor that is compatible with automated workflows and high-performance computing environments. Alquor processors have already been validated in numerous research papers and adopted worldwide, supporting a range of quantum optics, communication, and computing studies.

Read source

Daniel Simon announces polynomial-time quantum algorithm for the Dihedral Coset Problem

Simon, noted for Simon’s algorithm, has released a preliminary draft asserting the existence of a polynomial-time quantum algorithm for the Dihedral Coset Problem (DCP), a breakthrough that could challenge the theoretical foundation of lattice-based post-quantum cryptography. The DCP is directly linked through a series of well-established reductions to hard problems like approximate Shortest Vector Problem (SVP) and Learning With Errors (LWE), which underpin modern cryptographic standards such as ML-KEM and ML-DSA. While Simon’s paper has not yet undergone peer review and lacks some full proofs, a concurrent peer-reviewed result bridges the gap between Module-LWE and DCP, lending new plausibility to the cryptanalytic threat.

Read source

TuringQ initiates IPO tutoring process to pursue China’s first quantum computing public listing

TuringQ, based in Shanghai, has initiated the IPO tutoring process with the China Securities Regulatory Commission and sponsor Guotai Haitong Securities, aiming to become one of China’s first publicly listed quantum computing companies.

Read source

United States aims to build first industrially useful quantum computer by 2028, according to White House summit

The United States is intensifying efforts to build the world’s first fault-tolerant quantum computer by 2028, as outlined during the recent White House Quantum Summit. This target, set by the Trump administration, is notably ahead of the Defense Department’s Quantum Benchmarking Initiative, which has a 2033 goal for a similar achievement. Officials and industry leaders agreed that, while the 2028 deadline is highly ambitious, the accelerated timeline is expected to spur significant advancements in quantum computing, even if the exact target date is not met.

Read source

On July 30, IBM and several research partners released three papers claiming demonstrations of quantum advantage through trusted quantum computation. Jay Gambetta, IBM’s director of research, went further: “We are now firmly in the quantum advantage era.” [1][2]. That is a big statement. It is also a carefully engineered statement.

IBM is not claiming that its quantum computers can suddenly optimize global supply chains, discover profitable drugs or improve a bank’s trading book. Instead, it claims that quantum processors have now produced results that:

1. leading classical methods cannot reliably reproduce;
2. appear scientifically meaningful rather than purely artificial;
3. can still be trusted even when exact classical verification is impossible.
That third point is the real news. [1]

The three experiments

1. A verifiable, classically hard sampling experiment

IBM and the University of Chicago constructed a 70-qubit, depth-70 circuit containing 468 non-Clifford T gates. The computation used 97 physical qubits and a spacetime error-detection code. After post-selection, the researchers reported an approximately tenfold reduction in effective gate errors and certified a state-fidelity lower bound of 0.284 with 95% confidence. [2][3]

IBM says the quantum computation took about 15 minutes, while leading classical simulation approaches would require infeasible resources. [2]

The important nuance is that these are not 70 fully fault-tolerant logical qubits in the conventional sense used in long-term resource estimates. They are encoded, error-detected data qubits using post-selection. The distinction matters: this is an impressive intermediate error-correction experiment, but not a 70-logical-qubit universal fault-tolerant computer. [3][8]

It is also still a sampling experiment. Sampling benchmarks are excellent tests of system performance, but generally do not generate outputs a company can sell, manufacture or place on its balance sheet.

2. Discovering Floquet physics beyond reliable classical simulation

The second paper, led by Qedma with IBM, RIKEN, BlueQubit and Quantinuum, simulated the dynamics of a periodically driven Ising magnet using as many as 74 qubits on IBM’s Heron R3 processor. Qedma’s QESEM error-mitigation software produced magnetization measurements with percent-level precision and revealed long-lived oscillations in regimes where tensor-network simulations failed to converge and sparse Pauli-path calculations remained highly dependent on truncation choices. [4]

The results were subjected to several checks: independent mitigation estimators, modified noise levels, multiple IBM systems and partial cross-platform reproduction using Quantinuum trapped-ion machines. [4]

This is arguably the most scientifically interesting claim. The quantum device did not merely generate difficult random samples; it helped investigate an open question about non-equilibrium quantum matter.

But the classical comparison is subtle. The classical methods did not always produce no answer—they produced answers that disagreed or became unstable. The quantum computation is therefore being presented as the most credible estimate, supported by overlapping validation tests, rather than compared against a known exact solution. [4][8]

That is legitimate science. It is not a mathematical proof that no better classical method exists.

3. Trust without a classical ground truth

The Algorithmiq collaboration addresses the same problem more generally: what do we do when the quantum calculation enters a regime where classical algorithms disagree and no exact reference remains available?

The paper proposes a validation framework using smaller tractable instances, controlled manipulation of device noise, internal consistency tests and new observables such as an operator Loschmidt echo. The aim is to validate the process and its assumptions, rather than checking the final answer directly against a classical computer. [5]

Algorithmiq says its heterogeneous-material simulation has remained unmatched across the complete tested regime for eight months. It is also releasing its best classical method, "monoprop", so others can attack the result. [6]

This open-challenge model is healthy. IBM’s Quantum Advantage Tracker publishes circuits and results so that classical-computing researchers can attempt to overturn the claims. The project includes contributors from IBM, Qedma, Algorithmiq, RIKEN, BlueQubit, universities and national laboratories. [1][7]

So, is the claim legitimate?

Broadly, yes—but with an asterisk large enough to have its own dilution refrigerator.

The research is substantive. The experiments are large, the error-control methods are sophisticated, the classical comparisons involve serious teams and hardware, and IBM has released enough material for the results to be challenged. Cross-platform checks using Quantinuum systems make the physics claim considerably stronger than a purely self-referential IBM benchmark. [2][4][7]

IBM has also learned from the history of quantum-advantage announcements. Google’s 2019 Sycamore experiment initially claimed that a classical supercomputer would need approximately 10,000 years for a sampling task completed in 200 seconds. IBM immediately proposed a classical route requiring roughly 2.5 days, and subsequent algorithmic improvements reduced the classical cost dramatically further. [9][10]

IBM’s own 2023 “quantum utility” experiment suffered a similar fate. The original Nature paper demonstrated accurate expectation-value measurements on a 127-qubit processor at scales beyond brute-force simulation. Within weeks, researchers produced sparse-Pauli classical simulations that reproduced the results on a laptop faster than the reported quantum workflow. [11][12][13]

That did not make the quantum experiments worthless. It made classical algorithms better. Quantum-advantage claims are not Olympic records carved in stone; they are invitations to a particularly nerdy bar fight.

The new IBM work is more defensible because verification is built into the experiments and because the physics results are supported through several independent tests. However, all three papers are recent preprints and have not yet received the level of external scrutiny that follows a high-profile claim over several months. [3][4][5][8]

The correct conclusion today is therefore:

“IBM has presented credible evidence of quantum computational advantage over the classical methods tested so far. It has not demonstrated permanent advantage over every possible future classical method.”

Does this mean quantum computing will hit corporate P&Ls?

IBM CEO Arvind Krishna says quantum computing could begin making a measurable contribution to IBM’s revenue and profit around 2028 or 2029. He has also discussed the possibility of quantum creating approximately $1 trillion of value by the end of the 2030s. [14]. Nothing in these three papers proves that forecast.

The experiments involve quantum magnets, heterogeneous model systems and structured circuit sampling. They do not calculate the economic value of a drug candidate, reduce the cost of industrial production, outperform commercial optimization software or show a total workflow that is cheaper than using CPUs and GPUs. [3][4][5][8]

In fact, the relevant economic comparison must include:

• Quantum hardware access

• Calibration and queueing

• Repeated circuit execution

• Discarded runs from post-selection

• Error-mitigation overhead

• Classical preprocessing and post-processing

• Specialist labour

• Cost of validating the answer

A 15-minute quantum circuit is not necessarily a 15-minute business solution.

There is nevertheless a plausible line from this research to future commercial value. Materials science and chemistry are among the domains where classical simulation becomes expensive precisely because nature itself is quantum mechanical. Reliable quantum simulation could eventually accelerate the search for catalysts, battery materials, superconductors and molecular structures.

But “could influence scientific R&D” is several steps away from “will improve next quarter’s operating margin.”. IBM may still see P&L impact by 2028–2029 through selling access, consulting, software and infrastructure, even if its customers have not yet generated superior business outcomes. Vendor revenue is not the same thing as customer quantum advantage.

What should companies do now?

Do not rewrite the corporate strategy deck around Thursday’s press release. Also do not dismiss the result. Companies with genuine exposure to computational chemistry, materials, condensed-matter physics or high-value scientific modelling should now move from generic quantum education toward disciplined benchmarking. That means identifying expensive classical workloads, preserving data and model pipelines, and testing full hybrid workflows—not celebrating qubit counts.

Every future claim should be subjected to four separate questions:

1. Is it classically hard? Hard compared with which algorithms, on which hardware, under which accuracy requirement?

2. Is the result trustworthy? Is there direct verification, statistical certification, cross-platform reproduction or only extrapolation from easier instances?

3. Is the problem useful? Does the output answer a scientific or business question, rather than simply proving that the processor can execute a difficult circuit?

4. Is there economic advantage? Is the end-to-end workflow faster, cheaper or more accurate after including mitigation, orchestration, classical compute and human expertise?

IBM has made meaningful progress on the first two questions. The second paper begins to address the third. None of the papers settles the fourth.

The Quantum Pirate verdict

IBM’s announcement is not vaporware, and it is stronger than many previous quantum-supremacy claims. The shift from “our result is too difficult to check” toward “here is why you can trust it anyway” is an important intellectual and engineering advance. But declaring a universal “quantum advantage era” is premature.

We may be entering an era of repeatable, scientifically credible advantage candidates: quantum computations that survive serious classical comparison, produce new physical insight and include explicit validation frameworks. That is a real milestone.

But it is not yet the era of quantum EBITDA. Keep the champagne cold. Do not open it until someone shows the invoice, the classical alternative and the measurable business result.

Sources and references

[1] Kandala, A., Javadi-Abhari, A. and Gambetta, J. “Researchers demonstrate quantum advantage through trusted quantum computation.” IBM Quantum Blog, 30 July 2026. IBM’s overview of the three experiments, its definition of quantum advantage and the Quantum Advantage Tracker.

[2] IBM and the University of Chicago. “IBM and The University of Chicago Demonstrate Quantum Advantage, Establishing Trusted Quantum Computation on Logical Circuits.” IBM Newsroom, 30 July 2026. Contains IBM’s description of the 70 encoded qubits, 2,415 logical two-qubit operations, 468 T gates, tenfold error reduction and approximately 15-minute execution.

[3] Martiel, S. et al. “Sampling Hard Circuits with Verifiably High Fidelity.” arXiv:2607.25941, July 2026. Primary preprint for the IBM–University of Chicago doped-Clifford sampling and spacetime-code experiment.

[4] Leviatan, E. et al. “Resolving Structure in Prethermal Floquet Dynamics with Precision Quantum Computation.” arXiv:2607.24937, July 2026. Primary paper for the Qedma-led 74-qubit Floquet experiment, classical comparisons and Quantinuum cross-platform checks.

[5] Maniscalco, S. et al. “Observable Estimation in the Absence of Classical Verification.” arXiv:2607.25998, July 2026. Primary paper describing the Algorithmiq validation framework and operator Loschmidt echo.

[6] IBM and Algorithmiq. “IBM and Algorithmiq Demonstrate Quantum Advantage, Establishing a Framework for Trusted Quantum Computation Beyond Classical Verification.” IBM Newsroom, 30 July 2026.

[7] Quantum Advantage Tracker. Public benchmark repository and challenge platform for candidate quantum-advantage experiments, classical responses, circuits and datasets. The tracker treats entries as active claims subject to further challenge rather than permanently settled results.

[8] Ivezic, M. “IBM Claims ‘Trusted Quantum Advantage’ With Three Simultaneous Papers. Here’s What the Numbers Actually Show.” PostQuantum.com, 1 August 2026. Independent critical analysis distinguishing error-detected data qubits from fully fault-tolerant logical qubits and scientific advantage from commercial utility.

[9] Arute, F. et al. “Quantum Supremacy Using a Programmable Superconducting Processor.” Nature 574, 505–510, 2019. Original Google Sycamore quantum-supremacy paper.

[10] Pednault, E. et al. “Leveraging Secondary Storage to Simulate Deep 54-Qubit Sycamore Circuits.” IBM Research preprint, 2019. IBM’s proposed classical simulation strategy challenging Google’s original 10,000-year runtime estimate.

[11] Kim, Y. et al. “Evidence for the Utility of Quantum Computing Before Fault Tolerance.” Nature 618, 500–505, 2023. IBM’s 127-qubit quantum-utility experiment.

[12] Begušić, T. and Chan, G. K.-L. “Fast Classical Simulation of Evidence for the Utility of Quantum Computing Before Fault Tolerance.” arXiv:2306.16372, 2023. Demonstrated sparse-Pauli classical reproduction on a laptop.

[13] Begušić, T. et al. “Fast and Converged Classical Simulations of Evidence for the Utility of Quantum Computing Before Fault Tolerance.” Science Advances, 2024. Peer-reviewed follow-up presenting several classical methods capable of reproducing the IBM observables.

[14] Swayne, M. “IBM CEO Expects Quantum Computing to Drive Revenue by 2020s, Trillion-Dollar Value by End of 2030s.” The Quantum Insider, 31 July 2026. Reports Arvind Krishna’s expectations for measurable revenue and earnings impact in 2028–2029 and approximately $1 trillion of value by the end of the 2030s.

—

Plenty of big claims this week. We have already talked plenty about IBM Advantage claims, so lets move on. Anthropic’s researchers used their Claude Mythos AI to expose fresh cryptanalytic weaknesses: HAWK, a post-quantum digital signature candidate, lost serious key strength in 60 hours of mostly hands-off AI work—raising flags for NIST and the rest of us. Over in China, the government is pushing quantum tech out of the lab and into the power grid, rolling out nationwide after a successful pilot that promises fewer blackouts and better grid resilience. On the industry and investment front, AT&T doubled down on D-Wave, signing a new deal to push annealing hardware into real-world network operations—think outage detection and technician routing—with an eye on future gate-models for quantum-safe networking. Q-CTRL boasted a software integration that made quantum materials simulation 3,000 times faster than the classical best, shrinking 100 hours of work to just two minutes on IBM hardware. The Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center scored $5 million from the National Science Foundation to build TangleLab: a quantum-classical testbed with partners Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Rigetti—good for workforce training and actually figuring out hybrid workflows. EY Canada is rolling out an on-site, enterprise-dedicated quantum machine as part of their $3 billion bet on AI and quantum, aiming for use cases where regulatory control and data locality trump cloud convenience. Zuriq rased a capital round from Quantonation amongs others and Multiverse went full into AI becoming a Spanish unicorn (remember it was a quantum company?)

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Deutsch Jozsa Algorithm

Latest strip published August 2, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

In 1992, physicists David Deutsch and Richard Jozsa posed a deceptively simple question. Imagine you have a black box containing a function that takes a string of bits as input. This function is guaranteed to be one of two types: The post Deutsch Jozsa Algorithm first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

Pasquale Scarlino’s team develops faster, hardware-efficient superconducting qubit readout architecture

Researchers at EPFL, in collaboration with the University of Sherbrooke, have created an improved method for reading superconducting quantum bits (qubits) that achieves faster and more accurate measurements while simplifying hardware requirements.

Read source

Related coverage: A way to read quantum bits faster and with less hardware

Anthropic researchers use Claude Mythos to discover new attacks on HAWK and reduced-round AES cryptographic algorithms

Anthropic researchers, using their Claude Mythos Preview AI system, have achieved two notable cryptanalysis results. The first is an improved attack against HAWK, a candidate post-quantum digital signature scheme under review by NIST, where Claude was able to halve the effective key strength in about 60 hours of largely autonomous work — raising concerns about HAWK’s candidacy and highlighting the need for revised key sizes. Anthropic has also released a benchmark to facilitate wider study of large language models in cryptanalysis.

Read source

QURECA, TEC12, and INEXSU to organize fourth Quantum Latino conference in Medellín

The fourth edition of Quantum Latino, the largest quantum event in Latin America, is scheduled for October 21-23, 2026, as a hybrid conference in Medellín, Colombia. Organized by QURECA, TEC12, and INEXSU, the event aims to raise awareness and promote quantum technologies while fostering a connected quantum community across the region. Over three days, the conference will convene researchers, entrepreneurs, startups, and industry collaborators for learning, discussion, networking, and collaboration, complemented by an industry exhibition.

Read source

China to implement quantum technology nationwide to improve power grid reliability after successful trial

China is set to widen the use of quantum technologies, including highly precise sensors and advanced computer simulations, throughout its power grid after an 18-month pilot project in Hefei, Anhui province proved successful. Quantum technology, which leverages the ability of atomic-scale systems to exist in multiple states simultaneously, has transitioned from laboratory research to practical applications, offering speed, precision, and enhanced security. Based on the trial’s success, the technology will now be implemented nationwide with the goal of reducing blackouts and supporting future power grid development.

Read source

Multiverse Computing announces $570 million Series C funding round to expand efficient AI solutions

Multiverse Computing announced a $570 million (€500M) Series C funding round at a $1.7 billion (€1.5B) pre-money valuation, a 5x step-up from its Series B. The round, advised by JP Morgan and Santander CIB, is expected to bring total funding to $800 million, inclusive of prior rounds, and may remain open to select additional strategic investors. Since closing its Series B in June 2025, Multiverse Computing has grown annualized revenue by more than 10x, with 96x year-over-year sales growth in Q1 of 2026, reaching a run rate that positions the company among the fastest-growing AI labs and infrastructure businesses in Europe. Multiverse switched from quantum inspired algorithms to compressed LLMs in the era of AI.

Read source

AT&T signs agreement to expand use of D-Wave quantum computing technology in network operations

AT&T has signed a new agreement to expand its adoption of D-Wave’s quantum computing technology, focusing on integrating D-Wave’s annealing systems into network operations. The expanded partnership aims to apply quantum solutions to broader use cases such as outage detection, technician routing, network planning, and traffic management, supporting AT&T’s efforts to modernize its converged fiber and 5G network amid growing AI-driven demands. Additionally, AT&T is evaluating D-Wave’s forthcoming gate-model quantum systems for potential use in quantum security and communications, indicating a long-term move towards advanced computational capabilities within its broader innovation strategy.

Read source

Related coverage: AT&T Signs Agreement to Expand Use of D-Wave’s Quantum Computing Technology Across Network Operations

Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center to build TangleLab hybrid supercomputer for quantum-classical research

The Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center will develop TangleLab, a hybrid quantum-classical computing platform, with $5 million in funding from the National Science Foundation. This initiative, involving partnerships with Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Rigetti Computing, aims to provide researchers, students, and educators hands-on access to integrated quantum and classical systems. TangleLab, set to begin construction in September 2026 and open fully in 2027, will serve as a national testbed for exploring how quantum computing can be effectively combined with traditional high-performance computing. The platform will inform the design and management of future computing architectures and support workforce training in quantum technologies, while giving users access through a competitive proposal and supported onboarding process.

Read source

ZuriQ raises $25.5 million seed round to develop scalable quantum chip architecture

ZuriQ, a Swiss quantum computing company spun out of ETH Zürich, today announced it has raised $25.5 million in seed funding to scale its trapped-ion quantum processors. The round builds on the company’s $4.2 million pre-seed round in 2025 and is led by Quantonation, with participation from Forward.one, Extantia, Firgun Ventures, and all previous round investors. ZuriQ will use the new capital to expand its team alongside research and development efforts as it works to significantly increase the number of qubits its architecture can support.

Read source

Q-CTRL accelerates quantum computing adoption with software integrations enabling enterprise capability, deployability, and usability

Commercial quantum computing is moving beyond technical milestones to a focus on delivering tangible business value for customers. Q-CTRL recently demonstrated that integrating its software with IBM Quantum infrastructure enabled a materials simulation to be completed 3,000 times faster than leading classical solvers, reducing compute time from 100 hours to two minutes. As usability, deployability, and operational integration improve, enterprises are preparing for broader quantum utility, with positive returns in sectors such as defense and advanced simulation anticipated as early as 2027.

Read source

Ernst & Young expands quantum computing capabilities with on-site quantum computer led by EY Canada

EY has announced the deployment of an on-site quantum computer, led by its Canadian division, as part of a broader investment exceeding US$3 billion in artificial intelligence and advanced technologies. The new quantum capabilities are intended to handle sensitive workloads such as optimization, fraud detection, data protection, and risk management, giving EY more direct control over data residency and application development. This move aims to accelerate the integration of quantum and AI for enterprise clients, transitioning quantum technology from concept to practical deployment and addressing regulatory and security requirements more effectively than cloud-based options.

Read source

IBM and University of Chicago achieve quantum advantage with 70 logical qubits and error correction

IBM and the University of Chicago have demonstrated quantum advantage using an innovative error correction scheme that allowed them to encode 70 logical qubits and solve a classically intractable problem in about 15 minutes.

Read source

IBM and Algorithmiq demonstrate quantum advantage with a framework for trusted computation beyond classical verification

IBM and Algorithmiq have announced a significant quantum computing milestone by jointly demonstrating quantum advantage through simulating heterogeneous quantum materials on IBM quantum hardware. Importantly, the team addressed the longstanding issue of verification by creating a new framework for trust in quantum computation when classical checks are not possible. As part of this advance, Algorithmiq released its leading classical simulation tool, enabling independent benchmarking and validation throughout the research community.

Read source

IBM CEO Arvind Krishna projects quantum computing will measurably impact company earnings by 2028 or 2029

IBM CEO Arvind Krishna announced that the company’s quantum computing investments are projected to have a measurable effect on its revenue and earnings by 2028 or 2029. Krishna said IBM expects the technology to generate a trillion dollars in value by the end of the 2030s, citing new research with startup Algorithmiq that demonstrates quantum computers’ superiority over classical systems for certain problems. Despite skepticism over the technology’s commercial readiness due to challenges like high error rates and scalability, IBM has pledged $1 billion alongside U.S. Government investment to develop a quantum chip foundry, highlighting substantial progress and ongoing industry competition.

Read source

Terra Quantum and Apex.AI implement NIST-standardized post-quantum cryptography for secure cloud communication in software-defined systems

Terra Quantum and Apex.AI have jointly demonstrated the use of NIST-standardized post-quantum cryptography to enable secure communication between software-defined robotic systems and cloud-based control platforms. The companies highlight the relevance of this work for industries managing assets with long service lifespans, where resilience against future quantum-enabled attacks is critical.

Read source

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Controlled Not Gate

Latest strip published July 26, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

The CNOT (Controlled-NOT) gate is the standard two-qubit gate in quantum computing. It takes two qubits as input: a control qubit and a target qubit. If the control qubit is in state 1, the target qubit is flipped (0 becomes The post Controlled Not Gate first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

IonQ demonstrates quantum fine-tuning reduces AI energy consumption and achieves energy break-even at 34 qubits

AI’s rapid growth is already straining global power grids — and the enterprise bottom line. It leans on error mitigation techniques, which are co-designed with the compiler and therefore tailored to IonQ’s hardware architecture, to mitigate operational noise and extract substantial utility out of existing quantum hardware. Exponential scaling paradox Since ETS is a key metric, the IonQ researchers compared and contrasted the energy needs of classical computing simulations and quantum runs on the Forte Enterprise processor.

Read source

Simons Foundation researchers used classical computers to solve a quantum problem previously thought to require quantum hardware

Researchers at the Simons Foundation’s Center for Computational Quantum Physics, collaborating with Boston University, have solved a quantum simulation problem previously believed to require quantum hardware using only an ordinary laptop and advanced mathematical techniques.

Read source

Quantinuum and SoftBank Corp. release joint white paper mapping quantum computing applications to hardware roadmap

Quantinuum and Softbank have jointly published a white paper, “Quantum Computing Frontiers,” which analyzes how advances in quantum hardware and algorithms could enable practical industrial applications in fields like quantum chemistry and graph analytics. The report maps these use cases against Quantinuum’s hardware roadmap, focusing on areas such as materials discovery and large-scale fraud detection that SoftBank is already researching with Quantinuum’s systems. The findings are intended to guide strategies for future quantum AI data center services and business models as the technology matures.

Read source

Related coverage: [PAPER] Academic–industry coalition details roadmap for neutral atom quantum computers: targets scalable photonic control, robust error correction, and processor interconnects for distributed tasks Here’s the real news: blueprints, not breakthroughs. Clear priorities but no silver bullets—yet. Watch this space; engineering marathon ahead, not a sprint.

IBM acquires HRL Laboratories to expand quantum computing with spin qubit technology

IBM has announced the acquisition of HRL Laboratories, a private quantum computing research lab previously owned by Boeing and General Motors, in a move that establishes a two-pronged approach to its quantum computing initiatives. Traditionally, IBM has focused on building quantum devices using superconducting circuits, but with the HRL deal, it will add electron spin-based qubits to its capabilities. HRL’s expertise will be integrated into IBM’s operations, including chip manufacturing at IBM’s facility in New York, to accelerate the development of spin-based quantum technologies.

Read source

Related coverage: IBM acquires HRL Laboratories to advance spin qubit and quantum computing technologies

Northwestern University researchers achieve first real-world quantum entanglement over telecom fiber carrying commercial internet traffic

Northwestern University researchers have achieved the first real-world distribution of entangled photons over a 24.4-kilometer fiber-optic cable running between Evanston and downtown Chicago while the cable simultaneously carried high-capacity internet traffic. By transmitting quantum signals alongside conventional data streams in the same fiber, they demonstrated that quantum entanglement could be preserved with over 94% fidelity, even amid heavy optical traffic. This advance shows that quantum networks could be built using existing telecommunications infrastructure, and the team now aims to enable quantum teleportation over similar commercial links.

Read source

IBM pledges up to $50 million in quantum computing access to support United States Department of Energy Genesis Mission

IBM has pledged to provide up to $50 million in quantum computing access to support the U.S. IBM’s contribution includes quantum system access powered by its 156-qubit Heron and 120-qubit Nighthawk processors, which will be made available to DOE national laboratories and collaborators over five years. The goal is to accelerate scientific breakthroughs in areas such as energy and national security through combined compute platforms and innovative research workflows.

Read source

University of Stuttgart researchers commission system to control 2,000 laser beams for scalable Rydberg atom quantum computer

Researchers at the 5th Physics Institute, University of Stuttgart, have reached a major milestone in their Rydberg atom-based quantum computer project by commissioning an advanced laser-optical system developed with the Fraunhofer Institute for Laser Technology. The technology integrates over 150 components into a compact footprint and uses 20 acousto-optic modulators to rearrange atom positions dynamically during computation. Following successful initial tests, the team aims to investigate fault-tolerant architectures with several hundred to a thousand qubits, advancing the prospects for scalable quantum computers based on neutral atoms in Germany.

Read source

Alaina Green, Norbert Linke, and colleagues demonstrate that controlled quantum randomness and machine errors can enhance neural network performance

A team of researchers from the NSF Quantum Leap Challenge Institute for Robust Quantum Simulation, in collaboration with the Joint Quantum Institute and IBM, has demonstrated that quantum measurement-induced randomness, and even some hardware errors, can improve the performance of neural networks running on quantum computers. Results showed that introducing an optimal level of quantum randomness during inference led to higher accuracy in cases where classical or zero-randomness approaches failed.

Read source

PsiQuantum secures $125 million agreement with Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to test quantum computing hardware and software

PsiQuantum has secured a $125 million contract with the U.S. The agreement is part of DARPA’s Quantum Benchmarking Initiative, which seeks to assess the possibility of creating an industrially useful quantum computer by 2033, and will fund comprehensive testing of PsiQuantum’s photonics-based quantum hardware and software. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), representing its largest government award so far.

Read source

Israel Innovation Authority launches NIS 100 million national quantum computing R&D infrastructure initiative

The infrastructure will integrate at least three different quantum processing technologies and serve as a national center for the evaluation, integration, and adoption of quantum computing technologies. This is not merely an investment in technology, it is an investment in Israel’s future, its resilience, and its ability to lead the economy of the 21st century.” Dror Bin, CEO of the Israel Innovation Authority: “Quantum computing is expected to fundamentally transform the way industries address highly complex computational challenges. The national quantum computing infrastructure is a cornerstone in building an ecosystem that connects academia, industry, and government, accelerates breakthrough innovation, and reinforces Israel’s position as a global innovation powerhouse.

Read source

SAXON Q launches room-temperature diamond quantum computers for commercial deployment

SAXON Q, a Leipzig University spinout, has commercially launched two room-temperature diamond quantum computers, the SXQ128 and SXQ512, that fit ordinary server racks and require no cryogenic cooling. These systems are claimed to be the first diamond-based NV-center quantum computers exceeding 10 qubits to reach the commercial market, with the SXQ128 offering 128 qubits and the SXQ512 scaling to 512. The company’s goal is to make quantum computing more accessible by removing the specialized infrastructure barrier, opening adoption to enterprise and research users who previously could not justify cryogenic systems. The real-world impact will depend on customer results, but this marks a significant step toward wider quantum hardware deployment.

Read source

Infleqtion to deploy fault-tolerant neutral-atom quantum computer in Illinois in 2027

Infleqtion announced plans to deploy a fault-tolerant neutral-atom quantum computer at the Illinois Quantum & Microelectronics Park, with installation targeted for 2027. The upcoming system, known as Sqale, aims to demonstrate over 50 logical qubits en route to a 100-logical-qubit milestone, and is architected for scaling beyond 1,000 physical qubits, backed by integration with NVIDIA NVQLink for hybrid quantum-classical workflows. Access to the platform will be provided via Infleqtion’s Superstaq software through the National Quantum Algorithm Center.

Read source

Qedma integrates quantum error mitigation software with Quantinuum’s computing platform

Qedma has integrated its Quantum Error Suppression and Error Mitigation (QESEM) software with Quantinuum’s quantum computing platform, aiming to boost circuit fidelity for research and enterprise users. This collaboration, developed through Quantinuum’s Startup Partner Program, allows clients to apply Qedma’s error suppression techniques directly to their quantum computations, supporting more complex workloads and higher accuracy than previously possible. The integration is intended to accelerate advanced research and widen the range of real-world quantum applications, with both companies highlighting their commitment to expanding software-hardware synergies for commercial and scientific advancement.

Read source

Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park and Quantum Strategic Industry Alliance for Revolution sign partnership to promote collaboration between quantum sectors in Illinois and Japan

The Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park (IQMP) and Japan’s Quantum STrategic industry Alliance for Revolution (Q-STAR) have formalized a memorandum of understanding to deepen collaboration between the quantum technology sectors in Illinois and Japan. Signed at the Global Quantum Forum in Chicago by leadership from both organizations, the agreement focuses on fostering access to funding, networks, and investment for startups and small to medium enterprises in both regions. The partnership also aims to spur joint research, technology co-development, and supply chain growth by connecting companies, universities, and research institutions across Illinois and Japan.

Read source

Trump Administration allocates over $5 billion for Genesis Mission to advance national AI for science initiatives

The Trump administration has committed more than $5 billion to the Genesis Mission, a substantial national initiative aimed at advancing the use of artificial intelligence for scientific research. Led by the White House and launched in late 2025, the project involves over 15 federal agencies contributing resources ranging from research awards to specialized datasets and research facilities. The initiative is positioned to foster faster medical breakthroughs, improve infrastructure resilience, enhance national security, and strengthen America’s leadership in AI and science.

Read source

Related coverage: Argonne National Laboratory develops AI agent to automate and optimize quantum circuit design for nuclear physics · AI-Enabled Optimization of Quantum Circuit Design for Realistic Nuclear Problems | Argonne National Laboratory

Terra Quantum and Apex.AI implement NIST-standardized post-quantum cryptography for secure edge-to-cloud communication in intelligent systems

Terra Quantum and Apex.AI have jointly succeeded in implementing NIST-approved post-quantum cryptography to secure communications between Apex.AI-based robotic systems and cloud control platforms.

Read source

Quantum Open Source Foundation publishes curated list of over 200 open-source quantum computing projects

The collection is organized into categories including programming frameworks like Qiskit and Cirq, simulators, compiler tools, error correction libraries, and educational tools, as well as algorithm and hardware platform repositories. Maintained collaboratively by researchers and developers from major quantum organizations, this resource is designed as a living directory that efficiently connects users with mature industry tools and emerging research projects.

Read source

IQM Quantum Computers and Deutsche Bahn demonstrate quantum algorithm for railway scheduling using real operational data

IQM and Deutsche Bahn have jointly demonstrated a hybrid quantum-classical algorithm for optimizing railway scheduling using real operational data. Results showed the method yields feasible solutions with current hardware, with the quality of solutions improving as quantum processors handle larger subproblems—suggesting the approach will scale with advancing hardware.

Read source

Related coverage: IQM and Deutsche Bahn Demonstrate Quantum Algorithm for Railway Scheduling on Real Operational Data - HPCwire

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Quantum Simulation

Latest strip published July 19, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

In 1981, physicist Richard Feynman pointed out a fundamental mismatch in computer science. Nature is inherently quantum mechanical, but the computers we use to model it are strictly classical. He proposed a direct solution. If you want to make an The post Quantum Simulation first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

Quantinuum, Rolls-Royce, Riverlane, and University of Edinburgh sign agreement to advance quantum computing for industrial design

Quantinuum, Rolls-Royce, Riverlane, and the University of Edinburgh’s EPCC have announced a multi-year agreement to explore how fault-tolerant quantum computing could enhance complex fluid dynamics simulations for industrial uses such as gas turbine design. The project will bring together Quantinuum’s Helios quantum platform, Rolls-Royce’s industrial expertise, Riverlane’s knowledge in quantum error correction and algorithms, and EPCC’s supercomputing capabilities to develop and test hybrid quantum-classical workflows. Efforts will focus on testing computational building blocks and scaling quantum algorithms for industrial applications, supporting the UK’s quantum computing strategy.

Read source

Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf researchers show quantum mechanics can be formulated without imaginary numbers

Researchers from Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf and the German Aerospace Center have challenged the long-held assumption that quantum mechanics fundamentally relies on imaginary numbers. Their new study, published in Physical Review Letters, revisited and altered a restrictive postulate from a prominent 2021 analysis, instead using a physically motivated method to combine quantum systems. The result suggests that imaginary numbers are not fundamentally necessary for the mathematical formulation of quantum mechanics and could, in principle, be replaced by formulations utilizing only real numbers.

Read source

Jane Goodall Institute USA, FormationQ, and IonQ launch quantum computing programme to study ecological factors in primate conflict and cooperation

The Jane Goodall Institute USA and FormationQ, with support from IonQ, have launched a two-year research programme using advanced quantum computing to investigate why chimpanzees and bonobos, two closely related species, display starkly different patterns of intergroup behavior. By applying IonQ’s trapped-ion quantum systems and the B3GET agent-based model, scientists will simulate how factors like food distribution, home range size, and social grouping influence either violence or peaceful interactions between groups. This initiative relies on decades of field research and aims to address the ecological variables underlying lethal aggression in chimpanzees, contrasted with bonobos’ peaceful coexistence.

Read source

QuiX Quantum unveils Carina, a universal photonic quantum computing architecture for commercial deployment

QuiX Quantum has announced Carina, described as the first universal photonic quantum computing architecture built for deployment in commercial data center environments. Carina was developed within the German Aerospace Center’s Quantum Computing Initiative and is designed as a compact, room-temperature system that integrates technologies needed for measurement-based photonic quantum computing. Unlike prior photonic systems limited to specialized use cases, Carina supports a universal gate-set, enabling the implementation of any gate-based quantum algorithm.

Read source

Qolab Inc. raises $54.2 million in Series B funding led by UC Investments to advance quantum computing

Santa Barbara–based startup Qolab Inc., co-founded by Nobel laureate John Martinis, has secured $54.2 million in Series B financing led by UC Investments. Qolab, building on foundational research in superconducting quantum computing, aims to develop scalable quantum technologies, furthering work that began with Martinis’ contributions at UC Santa Barbara and his leadership in the Google Quantum AI project. This new funding will be used to advance Qolab’s superconducting quantum computing platform, expand global partnerships, and intensify collaborations with the University of California research community.

Read source

Arq raises $1.4 million pre-seed funding to advance quantum internet hardware

Spanish quantum startup Arq has secured $1.4 million in pre-seed funding to advance its hardware for the quantum internet. The investment round was led by Ground State Ventures with participation from Big Sur Ventures, supporting Arq’s work on quantum repeaters designed for high-speed, secure data transfer between quantum computers over fibre optic networks. The new capital will fund a state-of-the-art lab and speed up development of next-generation quantum memory devices, targeting industries where quantum networking could unlock capabilities beyond current communication systems.

Read source

Mind Success launches AI-driven platforms to accelerate quantum hardware development

Mind Success has introduced two software platforms that integrate artificial intelligence and digital twin technologies to speed up the development of quantum hardware.

Read source

Quantum Computing Inc. completes $73.1 million acquisition of NHanced Semiconductors

Quantum Computing Inc. for $73.1 million in a combined cash-and-stock deal, with the agreement also including up to $72 million in additional performance-based incentives. This acquisition transitions QUBT from a research-centric organization toward expanded commercial production capacity, highlighted by the planned “Fab 2” manufacturing expansion.

Read source

Pravir Malik and experts outline priority of trust, security, and ethics in responsible quantum computing development

Early collaboration between industry, academia, and governments is recommended to establish standards and governance frameworks before quantum technology becomes entrenched and potentially harmful.

Read source

Quantum computing stocks decline 35% following federal mandate on post-quantum encryption standards

Quantum computing stocks experienced significant volatility following recent U.S. federal actions: after an initial surge of over 30% on the announcement of executive orders and CHIPS Act funding, shares of key sector players like IonQ, D-Wave, Rigetti, and Quantum Computing Inc. Have now dropped by about 35% from their peaks.

Read source

Nord Quantique Achieves Breakthrough in Quantum Error Correction with SPAM Errors Reduced to Below 0.1%

Nord Quantique, a quantum computing company advancing efficient, scalable, and error corrected architectures, recently published a research paper demonstrating quantum error correction (QEC) of a single-mode grid state qubit with state preparation and measurement (SPAM) errors below 0.1%; a roughly 100-fold improvement over prior results in comparable GKP-based systems, and now on par with error rates routinely seen in leading superconducting transmon qubit platforms. SPAM errors represent a fundamental challenge in quantum computing: even the most sophisticated error-correction protocols can be undermined by poorly prepared input states or unreliable readout. Nord Quantique’s research directly addresses this bottleneck and is compatible with its existing high-performance autonomous error correction, achieving superior SPAM performance without any compromise in logical error rates.

Read source

Photon Queue Wins $500,000 Grant to Establish Quantum Technology Presence in New Mexico

Photon Queue, a quantum technology company building high-efficiency quantum storage for next-generation quantum computing systems, today announced it has received $500,000 in grant funding to establish a presence in New Mexico. The funding includes support from the New Mexico Economic Development Department and Roadrunner Venture Studios, and will help Photon Queue expand its operations into Albuquerque, where the company plans to hire locally, lease space in Roadrunner’s quantum lab, and build out assembly, testing and verification capabilities for its quantum memory devices.

Read source

IBM Quantum unveils Nighthawk r2 processor with 25-fold increase in circuit throughput via new qubit reset design

IBM Quantum has introduced its Nighthawk r2 processor featuring a novel reset design that increases circuit throughput by 25 times compared to the earlier Heron processor.

Read source

IBM outlines three hardware metrics for evaluating quantum computer performance: programmable qubits, qubit operations, and circuit throughput

As quantum hardware advances toward fault-tolerance, measures like T-gate count are expected to emerge as a new standard for quality. IBM expects future systems, such as the Nighthawk r2, to deliver significant improvements in throughput, supporting more complex and cost-effective quantum computations.

Read source

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Quantum Speedup

Latest strip published July 12, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

Quantum computing is not a faster version of classical computing. If you could run a standard word processor or web browser on a quantum machine, it would likely run slower than it does on your smartphone. The concept of quantum The post Quantum Speedup first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

Mark Zhandry, Chinmay Nirkhe, John Bostanci, and Jonas Haferkamp prove quantum proofs are strictly more powerful than classical proofs for specific problems

A team of researchers—including Mark Zhandry, John Bostanci, Jonas Haferkamp, and Chinmay Nirkhe—have proven that there exist computational problems that fundamentally require quantum proofs, not just classical certificates. Their 100-page paper, awarded at the 2026 Symposium on Theory of Computing, focuses on the ‘spectral forrelation problem’, where only a quantum state serves as a valid proof due to the irreducible complexity stemming from quantum superposition and measurement disturbance. This work confirms, for the first time without controversial assumptions, that quantum proofs are categorically more powerful than classical ones.

Read source

Toward Quantum-Augmented Databases: New USC Study Aims to Break the Bottlenecks Slowing Modern Data Systems

Quantum Future Modern database systems are struggling to maintain real-time performance as data volumes and workloads continue to grow exponentially. Titled “Toward Quantum-Augmented Database Systems,” the five-year project is supported by a $627,250 NSF CAREER Award and will contribute to USC’s broader quantum computing initiatives , an area in which Sabek is heavily involved. His team has access to more than 10 IBM quantum processors and the D-Wave Advantage system, enabling researchers to work with cutting-edge technologies as they seek to move quantum computing from a largely theoretical field into practical systems engineering.

Read source

Rice University and the Max Planck Society launch international partnership on quantum materials research

Rice University and the Max Planck Society have launched the Quantum Materials – Rice and Max Planck Partnership (Q-RaMP) to advance basic research and accelerate innovation in quantum materials. Signed in Paris by Max Planck Society Vice President Claudia Felser and Rice President Reginald DesRoches, the initiative will support the identification and development of novel materials for computing, sensing, and energy technologies. The partnership emphasizes fostering young researchers through joint faculty hiring, graduate student exchanges, workshops, and collaborative working groups.

Read source

[PAPER] QuTech and Delft team nail 99.92% fidelity spin readout in silicon MOS dot

Metal–oxide–semiconductor (MOS) technology offers a promising route to scalable quantum computing based on spin qubits, but large-scale architectures require compact and sensitive sensors that preserve qubit connectivity and remain compatible with industrial fabrication. Here we demonstrate a dispersive spin–qubit sensor, a single-electron box (SEB), integrated within a bilinear unit cell of planar MOS quantum dots fabricated using an industrial 300-mm wafer process. Independent gate control of the SEB and double-quantum-dot tunnel rates enables optimization of the sensor, achieving state-of-the-art dispersive readout fidelities of 99.92% in 340 μs and 99% in 20 μs. We also develop a hidden Markov model of the two-electron spin dynamics, allowing a more accurate determination of the measurement outcome and corresponding fidelity. Our results show that the compactness and versatility of SEB-based charge sensing can be realized without compromising sensitivity, providing a scalable pathway for future MOS spin–qubit architectures.

Read source

Alfred University partners with Classiq to launch quantum computing initiative for engineering education and research

Alfred University and Classiq have launched a joint quantum computing initiative, announced July 7, to integrate Classiq’s quantum software engineering platform into engineering education and research. The collaboration aims to make quantum computing accessible to students and researchers without requiring deep coding skills, with applications in renewable energy, ceramics, glass, and materials science. Assistant Professor Junpeng Zhan has introduced the platform in courses and research, addressing energy grid optimization problems, and collaborating on NSF- and ISO-New England-funded projects.

Read source

Quantum Rings and qBraid partnership offers $50 in free quantum compute via Open Quantum integration

Tens of thousands of users of the qBraid quantum-cloud computing platform now have access to $50 in free quantum processing unit (QPU) compute through a new integration with Quantum Rings’ Open Quantum platform. The partnership, announced July 9, 2026, unlocks access to QPUs from IonQ , Rigetti , IQM , and AQT , offering developers and researchers a unified interface to explore diverse quantum architectures. By lowering barriers to experimentation with free and subsidized time, the collaboration aims to broaden participation in quantum computing and accelerate application development across multiple quantum systems.

Read source

[PAPER] Google Quantum AI taps reinforcement learning to boost real-time quantum error correction

Quantum error correction (QEC) is the primary strategy for protecting a quantum computer from the environment^1,2. The prerequisite of QEC is that errors must remain sufficiently rare, which requires perpetually adapting the control parameters of the computer to the drifting environmental conditions. The current solution to this problem is to terminate the entire quantum computation for recalibration, but it is incompatible with the long runtimes of future quantum algorithms^3,4. Here we address this challenge by unifying calibration with computation. We grant the QEC process^{5,6,7,8,9,10,11} a dual role: its error-detection events are not only used to correct the logical quantum state but are also repurposed as a learning signal, teaching a reinforcement learning agent^{12,13,14,15,16} to continuously steer the control parameters and stabilize the quantum system during computation. We experimentally demonstrate this framework on a Willow superconducting processor, improving the logical stability of the surface code 3.5-fold against injected drift. By synthesizing our full suite of technological advances, we achieve record performance of the surface and colour codes, with average logical error per cycle of 7.72(9) × 10⁻⁴ and 8.19(14) × 10⁻³, respectively. Numerical simulations of large codes with tens of thousands of control parameters confirm the scalability of our RL framework, revealing an optimization speed that is independent of system size. This work thus enables a new paradigm: a quantum computer that learns from its errors and never stops computing.

Read source

JPMorgan Chase and collaborators validate quantum-informed portfolio selection pipeline on trapped-ion hardware using real market data

Researchers from JPMorgan Chase and Amazon Advanced Solutions Lab present an end-to-end pipeline for quantum-informed portfolio selection, mapping the task to the Maximum Independent Set (MIS) problem on dense asset correlation graphs. Leveraging the recursive hybrid quantum-classical qReduMIS algorithm, the solution uses Quantinuum’s 98-qubit trapped-ion Helios hardware and real financial data from four major market indices. Standalone QAOA could not optimally solve the largest indices, but qReduMIS achieved success probabilities up to 0.95 and average approximation ratios of at least 0.96.

Read source

Fraunhofer opens application period for industry partners to submit quantum computing use cases

Fraunhofer’s INQUBATOR center has opened applications to businesses of all sizes seeking to develop quantum computing use cases. Until August 31, 2026, companies can apply, regardless of prior experience or hardware, to collaborate with Fraunhofer Institutes in developing and testing quantum algorithms using various international quantum computers. At least four new use cases will be selected, each to receive a tailored exploitation plan and collaborative development over approximately ten months.

Read source

IQM Quantum Computers Acquires Assets of Quantistry GmbH to Bridge the Gap Between Quantum Algorithms and Solutions for Industrial Enterprises

This is a strategic asset acquisition comprising proprietary software and intellectual property of Quantistry GmbH, a pioneer in cloud-native, AI-powered chemical and materials simulation By integrating Quantistry’s advanced simulation platform with IQM’s leading quantum computing hardware, IQM will deliver an end-to-end quantum-classical applications development platform and algorithm libraries powered by a user-friendly native-AI computing environment The transaction secures a critical enterprise software layer that accelerates IQM’s application roadmap, enabling industrial enterprises to develop quantum application proof-of-concepts and scale them over time, backed by a reliable, long-term quantum roadmap It also enhances IQM’s ability to deepen domain expertise across specific industry verticals Quantistry’s core quantum chemistry and machine learning engineering team will join IQM, strengthening the company’s ability to deepen relationships with tier-one industrial enterprises across Europe and globally

Read source

MagiQware raises €575,000 pre-seed funding to advance AI-driven quantum error correction

MagiQware has secured €575,000 in pre-seed funding led by Graduate Ventures, with participation from Delft Enterprises B.V., to address a core challenge hindering the advancement of practical quantum computers. The startup is focused on optimizing a critical component of quantum error correction, and early results demonstrate up to a 40% reduction in circuit length through a novel combination of reinforcement learning and quantum compiler optimization. The new funding will accelerate the development of MagiQware’s technology and foster collaborations within the growing quantum computing industry.

Read source

Bosch Ventures joins Quantum Motion’s $160 million Series C funding round

Silicon-based approach sets new benchmarks for cost, footprint, and energy efficiency in next-generation computing. Bosch Ventures already led the 2023 USD 50 million Series B financing round in the London based deep-tech startup. Dr. Ingo Ramesohl, Managing Director at Bosch Ventures. “By leveraging silicon, the team is bringing quantum computing onto a path that is both technologically compelling and economically sustainable.”

Read source

Oratomic raises $300 million in Series A funding to build a fault-tolerant quantum computer

Oratomic has secured a $300 million Series A funding round, co-led by ARCH Venture Partners, Spark Capital, Khosla Ventures, and joined by notable investors including Bezos Expeditions, Index Ventures, General Catalyst, and others. The company is focused solely on building the world’s first fault-tolerant quantum computer using a new approach to quantum error correction based on reconfigurable atomic arrays in laser beams. Oratomic is expanding its team and leveraging artificial intelligence to automate both research and quantum computer design, with a mission to achieve groundbreaking advances without pursuing intermediate commercial products.

Read source

Rigetti Computing expands access to 108-qubit quantum system through multiple cloud platforms and on-premise deployments

Rigetti Computing’s Q1 2026 results indicate a strategic pivot from focusing solely on quantum hardware to facilitating broader customer access and adoption. The release of its 108-qubit Cepheus-1 system, now available through Rigetti Quantum Cloud Services, Amazon Braket, Microsoft Azure Quantum, and qBraid, positions it as one of the world’s leading commercially available gate-based quantum computers. The company holds $569 million in cash, supporting ongoing technology investment and expansion.

Read source

White House issues executive order to boost quantum technology commercialization through government demand

The White House has issued an executive order aimed at accelerating the commercialization of quantum technologies by expanding government involvement and updating the national quantum strategy. Initiatives include the Quantum Computer for Application Development and Discovery Science (QC-ADDS) and a Defense Innovation Unit program that could invest up to $200 million in quantum sensing and timing technologies. The order emphasizes public-private partnerships, new procurement models like advance market commitments, and a focus on deploying real-world quantum capabilities beyond research, particularly for national security and commercial applications.

Read source

U.S. National Science Foundation launches Project Triad to integrate and commercialize quantum sensing, networking, and computing

The U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) has unveiled Project Triad, a new initiative aimed at combining quantum sensing, quantum networking and quantum computing into a single operational platform. Integrating the quantum stack Rather than advancing quantum sensing, networking and computing as separate technologies, Project Triad aims to integrate them into a unified system that can be refined, scaled and eventually commercialized by US industry.

Read source

Quantum Art and Classiq pursue multibillion-dollar public offerings on Wall Street via SPAC deals

Israeli quantum startups Quantum Art and Classiq are in advanced negotiations to merge with SPACs for Wall Street listings, seeking valuations between $2 billion and $5 billion each. Quantum Art, a Weizmann Institute spin-off specializing in trapped-ion quantum computers, has raised a total of $200 million and may become the first Israeli quantum company to list, possibly before the end of 2026. Israel’s quantum ecosystem is seeing increased investment, with expectations that public listings will provide necessary capital as the industry nears commercialization.

Read source

Cloudflare commits to ML-DSA for initial post-quantum signature migration due to urgency and lack of ready alternatives

Cloudflare highlights the urgency of migrating from RSA and ECC to post-quantum cryptography to address the imminent threat posed by quantum computers. Cloudflare’s transition is underway, with most traffic already secured by ML-KEM encryption, and a goal of full post-quantum security, including signatures, by 2029. The blog emphasizes that promising new signature schemes, such as FN-DSA and those advanced to the latest NIST competition round, will not mature in time for the first migration.

Read source

So, here’s the question: Quantum for 2028 or not? Jump into the analysis!

Useful Quantum by 2028 or 2030: The Bar That Matters

For this analysis, “Useful quantum computing” must mean something stricter than a lab milestone, a logical-qubit headline, or a clever benchmark. We are using a hardened standard: a quantum device counts as useful only if it does something better than the state of the art in other technologies on a real task that matters to end users (scientists can also be end users). It must be faster, more accurate, or cheaper, ideally with enough reproducibility that outsiders can verify the claim. This is closely aligned with DARPA’s “utility-scale” framing—where computational value exceeds cost—and is much stricter than press-release fluff like “scientifically relevant” or “fault-tolerant.”

This distinction matters. The quantum field is currently mixing together four different claims: error-correction progress, scientific relevance, commercial relevance, and stock-market excitement. A company can show a better logical qubit without proving an end-to-end advantage over classical workflows. A government can fund quantum at scale without proving that 2028 is technically realistic. And a SPAC-ed company can go public without making a single useful quantum computer. The whole argument turns on not confusing those layers.

What Washington Actually Just Did

The immediate trigger for the current wave of hype is real enough. On May 21, 2026, the U.S. Department of Commerce announced $2.01 billion in planned CHIPS incentives tied to quantum.

• $1 billion for IBM to establish a quantum foundry subsidiary for superconducting wafers.

• $375 million for GlobalFoundries.

• Planned funding (up to $100 million each) for Atom Computing, Diraq, D-Wave, Infleqtion, PsiQuantum, Quantinuum, and Rigetti.

Commerce explicitly stated the goal is to accelerate the race to utility-scale, fault-tolerant quantum computers, taking minority non-controlling equity stakes in the recipients.

The White House and the Department of Energy (DOE) pushed further. On June 23, 2026, the DOE announced Quantum Genesis, an initiative aiming to develop and deploy the world’s first scientifically relevant, fault-tolerant quantum computing capability by 2028. The DOE explicitly wants to demonstrate systems with logical qubits numbering in the low hundreds for applications in chemistry, materials science, and physics.

At the exact same time, DARPA has been running the opposite emotional program with its Quantum Benchmarking Initiative: less moonshot chest-thumping, more cold shower. They are trying to “separate hype from reality” and evaluate if any architecture can reach utility-scale by 2033. This is a tacit admission that while quantum computing has become strategic industrial policy, it is not yet a solved engineering discipline.

Why the Bullish Case is No Longer Crazy

The pro-2028 camp is no longer arguing from vibes alone; they have real technical and financial evidence.

• Error Correction Progress: Google’s Willow work demonstrated below-threshold quantum error correction, a long-standing checkpoint. In October 2025, Google claimed their Quantum Echoes algorithm on Willow ran 13,000 times faster than the best classical supercomputer algorithm for that task (on a problem nobody cared about).

• Hardware Milestones: Quantinuum reported computations with up to 48 error-corrected logical qubits on a 98-qubit trapped-ion processor. Roughly a the same time, QuEra and collaborators published a Nature result showing a fault-tolerant neutral-atom architecture with up to 96 logical qubits active simultaneously.

• Roadmaps: IBM’s Starling (2029) targets 200 logical qubits. Quantinuum expects Sol (2027) with up to 100 logical qubits, and Apollo (2029) with hundreds. Alice & Bob argue their cat-qubit path could reduce overhead enough to reach 100 high-fidelity logical qubits by 2030.

• Capital Injection: According to QED-C, the sector saw $12.7 billion in new government commitments and $4.9 billion in private VC in 2025. In June 2026, Quantinuum bypassed the SPAC route and executed a traditional IPO, raising $1.68 billion at $60 a share, debuting at a market value over $17 billion.

Capital does not equal usefulness, but it buys time, cryogenics, and foundry access—the boring infrastructure without which error correction dies in the loading dock.

Why the Skeptical Case is Still Stronger Than the Hype

The hard-nosed case against “true useful quantum by 2028” is not anti-quantum; it is anti-category error.

1. Logical Qubits Are Not Enough: Reaching hundreds of logical qubits by 2028 is plausible, but as RAND’s Edward Parker noted, they may still be noisy. Maryland’s Jay Sau was blunter: he cannot think of a scientific question a quantum computer could help with in 2028 without a massive breakthrough in device quality.

2. The Classical Target is Moving: Quantum roadmaps often compare tomorrow’s quantum machines to yesterday’s classical bottlenecks. HPC codes, tensor networks, and AI-based approximations are rapidly improving. To win, quantum must beat a moving opponent on wall-clock time, quality, or full-system economics.

3. Hype Contamination and Cash Burn: Public quantum firms burned roughly $500 million in operating cash across their recent financial years, with revenues remaining small and dominated by government contracts (representing over 90% of Rigetti’s revenue and 60% of Infleqtion’s in 2025). The SPAC route has often been a graveyard; when D-Wave went public via SPAC in 2022, only $9 million of the original $300 million trust remained after redemptions. In other words: Companies are getting funded by your tax money so they can win public contracts funded by… your tax money!

4. Claims Outrunning Evidence (The Microsoft Cautionary Tale): In June 2026, Nature published a severe critique by Henry Legg challenging Microsoft’s 2025 Majorana 1 paper. Legg argued the software used to identify the claimed topological gap produced inconsistent and misreported outcomes, comparing the validation effort to finding “Jesus in your toast” among random noise. Critic Sergey Frolov noted that Microsoft lacks the evidentiary arc of reliability seen in IBM or Quantinuum. PR velocity can still easily exceed physics velocity.

The Head-to-Head Comparison

The bullish camp advocating for a 2028–2030 arrival of useful quantum computing is led by prominent builders and strategists such as Hartmut Neven, Jay Gambetta, Rajeeb Hazra, Mikhail Lukin, Théau Peronnin, Pranav Gokhale, and Michael Kratsios among others. Their core claim is that quantum error correction has finally crossed critical technical thresholds, and when combined with the massive influx of recent capital, narrow scientific or industrial wins will successfully emerge well before broad commercial adoption takes over. For this thesis to win, at least one major hardware platform must deliver tens to low hundreds of genuinely usable logical qubits by 2028, maintaining low enough error rates and fast enough decoding to run deep, auditable circuits on problems where classical methods are inherently weak. By 2030, this capability must transition from a single “hero demo” into a repeatable, verified process across a handful of physical domains. However, this optimistic timeline will quickly fall apart if logical error rates unexpectedly plateau, decoder throughput bottlenecks persist, or if classical AI and high-performance computing rapidly leapfrog the target applications, ultimately rendering these early quantum systems far too expensive or slow to compete.

Conversely, the skeptical camp warning against a 2028–2030 timeline includes analytical empiricists and market realists like Jay Sau, Edward Parker, Jensen Huang, Henry Legg, Sergey Frolov, and Ivana Delevska, and of course Gil Kalai. Their core argument is that the industry is dangerous confusing intermediate logical-qubit milestones with actual utility, pointing out that hardware quality, circuit depth, full-system economics, and supply chains remain fundamentally inadequate while classical alternatives remain remarkably strong. The skeptical case will stay dominant if the best systems available by 2028 remain shallow, noisy, heavily reliant on postselection, or architecture-specific, or if the only claimed “wins” occur on highly contrived, company-picked benchmarks with heavily disputed real-world relevance. Furthermore, the broader narrative will collapse if the field continues to ship financial instruments and hype faster than trustworthy applications. The only way the skeptics lose is if a hardware provider completely upends their caution by delivering an undeniable, fully auditable wall-clock advantage on a lucrative, real-world chemistry or materials problem that the world’s best classical supercomputers simply cannot replicate.

Estimating the Real Odds (By The Pirate’s Sextant!)

By 2028: 20% Chance of True Utility

This is not zero. It reflects massive government backing, real error-correction progress, and a credible chance of a narrow scientific beachhead. But 2028 requires too many things to go perfectly at once: hardware scaling and industrialization, decoder throughput, and classical-quantum integration. As well as orchestration and platoform. Currently, the evidence supports “plausible,” not “probable.”

By 2030: 45% Chance of Narrow Utility, 20% Chance of Broad Commercial Utility

Roadmaps cluster heavily around 2029–2030 (IBM’s Starling, Quantinuum’s Apollo, Alice & Bob’s Graphene). The industry widely believes the 25–100 logical-qubit regime is the first serious application window. Why isn’t the percentage higher? Because roadmaps are self-reported, classical competitors will improve, and the Microsoft episode reminds us that narrative momentum does not equal empirical closure. But also, AI, HPC, and other technologies keep improving. The problems we may solve today with 25 logical qubits may be irrelevant in 3 years from now.

The Bottom Line: By 2028, we will likely get impressive early fault-tolerant prototypes and maybe an arguable scientific win. By 2030, we may see the first narrow, defensible utility claim. If forced to rank the contenders based on evidence rather than vibes, Quantinuum, QuEra and IBM sit in the first tier for the 2028–2030 race. Alice & Bob are also a serious contender if cat-qubit overhead reductions translate to reality. Microsoft, due to ongoing scientific disputes over the fundamental viability of its topological approach, remains too contested to place in the near-term winner circle.

The real transition to useful quantum computing won’t be marked by a flashy SPAC, a $2 billion government grant, or a higher valuation. It will be marked by one boringly decisive fact: a customer gets a result they couldn’t get otherwise, and they can prove it.

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Quantum Sensing

Latest strip published July 5, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

The same fragility that makes quantum computing so difficult to build makes quantum systems extraordinarily useful as sensors. A qubit is sensitive to everything around it: magnetic fields, electric fields, temperature, pressure, gravity, rotation. In a quantum computer, this sensitivity The post Quantum Sensing first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

QuEra Computing unveils updated roadmap for scalable fault-tolerant quantum computers

The Road to Commercially Valuable Fault-Tolerant Quantum Computing About Our Product Roadmap Like any scientific pursuit of this scale and significance, there are questions that must still be answered. Logical Encoding Libra uses high-rate codes to encode up to 256 logical qubits at a 10 -6 logical error rate, making it QuEra’s first Megaquop system capable of a million error-free quantum operations. Our roadmap recognizes this fact and doesn’t project systems still under development, instead, it outlines the products we feel are scientifically viable based on published, peer-reviewed research.

Read source

QuTech researchers demonstrate coherent coupling of diamond tin-vacancy center to nanocavity for scalable quantum networks

Researchers at QuTech have demonstrated a coherent and efficient interface between diamond-based tin-vacancy (SnV) quantum emitters and photons confined within nanoscopic optical cavities, marking a significant advance toward scalable and fast quantum networks. Their fabrication method yielded 327 high-quality devices across two chips, confirming the scalability of their approach. In experiments, a single SnV strongly controlled light transmission, and measurements showed coherent cooperativity above unity, a threshold for high-fidelity quantum operations.

Read source

The Trump Administration Doubles Down on Quantum A new pair of executive orders accelerate the timeline for a fault-tolerant quantum computer

On 22 June, President Donald Trump signed two executive orders focused on quantum computing : The first aims to accelerate the development of quantum computers, sensors, and networks. Department of Energy ( DOE ) has committed to deploy “the world’s first fault-tolerant , scientifically relevant quantum computer” by the ambitious deadline of 2028. “I think this executive order is in many ways a continuation of what’s been going on since 2018, when the first National Quantum Initiative Act was passed,” says Elizabeth Goldschmidt , associate professor of physics at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champagne (UIUC).

Read source

Shanghai launches Quantum Computing Future Industry Incubation Zone to advance quantum technology development

The Shanghai Quantum Computing Future Industry Incubation Zone, launched on Tuesday in the city’s Xuhui district, has attracted an initial cohort of 26 quantum firms. The zone would offer resources, talent and subsidies to expedite a shift from laboratory research towards a full-fledged industrial ecosystem for quantum computing, according to a report by the state-backed Jiefang Daily. The incubation zone would also provide up to 100 million yuan (US$14.73 million) to fund foundational research, technology innovation and platforms.

Read source

Researchers achieve autonomous calibration of a 112-qubit superconducting quantum processor using a language model agent

On a 112-qubit processor with frequency-tunable transmons, the system autonomously completes calibration of 108 out of 112 qubits in 4.7 hours, achieving a 4–5 × \times speedup over manual calibration of the full 112 qubits. This work demonstrates, for the first time, fully autonomous calibration of a hundred-qubit superconducting processor through reusable and auditable Skills, removing a critical barrier to scalable quantum hardware operation. On a 112-qubit superconducting processor, the system completes autonomous qubit characterization of 108 qubits with zero human intervention, achieving a 4–5 × \times speedup over manual operation.

Read source

Quantum made practical: U-M-led team advances to stage 2 of NSF center competition

A University of Michigan Engineering-led team is a contender for a $55 million center charged with demonstrating quantum technologies that work in the real world. Phase 2 adds $4M to the $1M pilot award, enabling the team to design connectable quantum photonic chips for field-ready, lab-grade measurements. If successful, the project will advance to phase 3, implementation, scaling into a $55M NSF quantum center to prototype field-deployable quantum photonic chips. Led by University of Michigan Engineering, the team includes partners at U.S. and international universities, industry, and government labs.

Read source

Han Zhao develops method using mechanical vibrations and superconducting systems to stabilize quantum operations

Assistant Professor Han Zhao at the University of Central Florida is developing a method that uses tiny mechanical vibrations combined with superconducting quantum systems to stabilize quantum operations. Powe Junior Faculty Enhancement Award, Zhao’s research introduces a topological ‘braiding’ technique to make quantum states more resilient to noise and errors. Supported by the Oak Ridge Associated Universities Ralph E.

Read source

Yale-led ERASE project receives $4 million NSF grant to advance error-correcting quantum computer development

A Yale-led project — aided by a national community of researchers — has reached the next step in its effort to develop the first large-scale, error-correcting quantum computer. More than a year ago, the ERASE project — Erasure Qubits and Dynamic Circuits for Quantum Advantage — was one of six pilot projects awarded $1 million grants by the National Science Foundation.

Read source

United States Department of Energy launches initiative to obtain useful quantum computer by 2028

The US Department of Energy’s Quantum Genesis initiative is targeting 2028 for when this will change. By 2028, the DoE wants quantum computers to be powerful enough to start contributing to open problems in chemistry , materials science, plasma physics and high-energy physics. Paul Stimers at the Quantum Industry Coalition says that several quantum computing firms previously announced plans to deliver a scientifically useful, error-proof quantum computer by 2028 or within a few years of that mark.

Read source

Quantum computers remain unable to solve practical tasks as companies and governments accelerate investments

Despite billions in investment from companies like Microsoft, IBM, and Google, and government programs aiming to accelerate the technology, no quantum computer has yet performed a commercially useful task. Most current machines are too small and error-prone for practical applications. Announcements like Microsoft’s Majorana 2 chip and government executive orders promise breakthroughs, but are met with skepticism from independent researchers, who point to persistent technical limitations and marketing hype.

Read source

Classiq Technologies and QAI Co., Ltd. announce first local Quantum-as-a-Service cloud platform for Korea

Classiq Technologies and QAI Co., Ltd. have announced a significant commercial agreement to launch Korea’s first local Quantum-as-a-Service (QaaS) offering. The partnership integrates Classiq’s enterprise-grade quantum software engineering platform with QAI’s domestic AI datacenter infrastructure, enabling Korean enterprises, public institutions, and research organizations to develop, validate, and execute quantum computing applications across diverse hardware.

Read source

IonQ leads quantum computing peers with strongest cash position and revenue growth in sector cash crisis

The article assesses the financial stability and outlook of four pure-play quantum computing companies: IonQ, Rigetti Computing, D-Wave Quantum, and Quantum Computing. IonQ leads with $3.1 billion in cash and a sharp Q1 revenue increase of 755% to $64.67 million, alongside strong future obligations and the pending SkyWater Technology acquisition. The report concludes IonQ is currently best equipped to last, funding growth through revenue momentum rather than dilution.

Read source

SpinQ Technology raises 1 billion yuan in Series D funding for development of fault-tolerant quantum computers

SpinQ Technology, a Chinese quantum computing firm, has completed a Series D funding round, raising 1 billion yuan (about $147 million) to advance the development of fault-tolerant quantum computers. The company has secured about 2 billion yuan over the past six months. Investors include CICC Capital, Shenzhen TopoScend Capital, Shanghai Semiconductor Industry Investment, AVIC Honghua, and Shanghai SEARI Private Equity Investment Management, with existing shareholders also participating.

Read source

IQM Quantum Computers Becomes First European Quantum Computing Company Listed on a Major U.S. Exchange

IQM begins trading on Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker symbol “IQMX”. Company enters next phase of growth as a publicly traded leader in full-stack superconducting quantum computing. IQM maintains a strong pro forma cash position of EUR 337 million

Read source

IQM shares fall 3.4% after public listing via SPAC merger in New York

Finnish quantum computing company IQM’s shares fell 3.4% to $12.97 on their first day of trading after going public in New York via a SPAC merger, despite an initial 24% jump to $13.42 the day before. The transaction raised $234 million through the SPAC and a PIPE investment. CEO Jan Goetz stated the proceeds will be used to expand facilities and make acquisitions, and cited IQM’s delivery of 18 machines and €31 million in revenue for 2025.

Read source

D-Wave Quantum Inc. selected to receive $1.57 million grant from National Science Foundation for dual-rail gate-model quantum computing project

DWave has been selected to receive a $1,566,250 grant from the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) through the agency's National Quantum Virtual Laboratory (NQVL) program. The funding will support D-Wave’s role as a key industry partner in ERASE (Erasure Qubits and Dynamic Circuits for Quantum Advantage) – a project focused on developing foundational technologies for fault-tolerant quantum computing and strengthening U.S. leadership in quantum innovation.

Read source

Microsoft accelerates transition to quantum-safe cryptography, targeting product readiness by 2029

Microsoft is accelerating its Quantum Safe Program (QSP) timeline, aiming to transition its products and services to post-quantum cryptography (PQC) by 2029 in response to advances in quantum research and changing risk assessments. The company is embedding PQC requirements into its Secure Future Initiative (SFI) and focusing on key priorities: upgrading network cryptography (with TLS 1.3 adoption), building crypto-agility for stored data, and modernizing cryptographic trust chains. This shift aligns with recent US and French government guidance to adopt quantum-safe measures by 2030 and aims to help customers start cryptographic inventory, prioritization, and modernization processes earlier for improved security and operational continuity.

Read source

QoreChain completes first end-to-end post-quantum 1,000 QOR transaction on public blockchain

On July 2, 2026, QoreChain completed a transfer of 1,000 QOR, claiming it is the first fully post-quantum transaction on a live public blockchain mainnet, a transfer now independently verifiable on a public block explorer. Unlike many projects that address only single cryptographic components, QoreChain secured the transaction end-to-end using all three NIST -standardized post-quantum algorithms: ML-DSA-87, ML-KEM-1024, and SHAKE-256. QoreChain Completes First End-to-End Post-Quantum Blockchain Transaction Unlike many projects making similar claims, QoreChain highlights that its transaction employed post-quantum cryptography across the entire cryptographic pathway, not merely replacing a single element vulnerable to future quantum computers.

Read source

Chicago Quantum Exchange forecasts Midwest quantum job market could reach 191,000 positions within a decade

The Midwest quantum job market could grow to 191,000 positions within a decade, according to a Chicago Quantum Exchange report cited by the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering (UChicago PME). UChicago PME, in partnership with Quantum Machines and the Chicago Quantum Exchange, piloted a workforce development program, offering seven students from City Colleges of Chicago hands-on training in quantum control using Quantum Machines’ OPX+ controller. The curriculum, co-designed by UChicago PME’s Danyel Cavazos and Quantum Machines’ Kristina Callaghan, mirrors the technical demands of research and industry, aiming to create a foundation for scaling workforce initiatives as quantum technology advances in the region.

Read source

PsiQuantum begins construction of facility for first utility-scale fault-tolerant quantum computer in Australia

PsiQuantum today broke ground and started construction on its facility at Moreton Bay Central, where the company will build and deploy the world's first utility-scale, fault-tolerant quantum computer. Minister for Industry and Innovation and Minister for Science Senator the Hon Tim Ayres, Queensland Minister for Science and Innovation the Hon Andrew Powell and City of Moreton Bay Mayor Peter Flannery joined PsiQuantum Chief Executive Officer Victor Peng and PsiQuantum Co-Founder and Executive Chair Prof. Jeremy O’Brien to mark the milestone.

Read source

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Qiskit

Latest strip published June 28, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

Qiskit is an open-source quantum software development kit created by IBM. It is the most widely used framework for writing, compiling, and executing quantum programs, and it has become the default entry point for much of the quantum computing community. The post Qiskit first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

Allstate and IBM demonstrate quantum-enabled portfolio optimization for insurance risk management

Allstate and IBM have collaboratively explored how quantum computing could optimize insurance portfolios by addressing the knapsack problem, which is critical due to complex, correlated risks in home insurance. Their research, published on arXiv in May 2026, implements a hybrid quantum-classical workflow using IBM Quantum Heron hardware to generate and refine candidate insurance portfolios. The approach demonstrates competitiveness with established classical methods, especially under tight constraints.

Read source

University of Sydney and IBM researchers identify and address key error sources to boost quantum computing fidelity

Researchers from the University of Sydney, in collaboration with IBM, have pinpointed key factors limiting the fidelity of quantum computers and demonstrated engineering strategies to mitigate these issues. Utilizing IBM’s 156-qubit Quantum Heron r2 superconducting processor, the team quantified how mid-circuit measurement noise, required for quantum error correction, can itself induce further errors. By redesigning error-correction circuitry to reduce qubit ‘idling’ during these measurements, logical qubit survival rates improved from under 90% to over 96% per error-correction cycle.

Read source

Quantum Elements and University of Southern California demo Monte Carlo algorithm simulating noisy quantum circuits 45x faster on classical hardware

Quantum Elements and the University of Southern California today announced the publication of a new Quantum Monte Carlo algorithm in Physical Review Letters, providing a more efficient way to simulate noisy quantum circuits on classical computers and supporting the company’s development of digital twins for quantum error correction.

Read source

Henry Legg challenges accuracy of Microsoft’s quantum chip claims in Nature journal

The Majorana 2 chip Microsoft’s claims it has made major breakthroughs in quantum computing have been questioned by a UK-based physicist, in a paper published by the science journal Nature. Dr Henry Legg, a long-term critic of Microsoft’s quantum work, argued a software tool used by the tech giant to check its research contained coding errors and was not sufficiently accurate. Legg also said Microsoft had still not proved its assertion that it has managed to create a theoretical quasi-particle called Majorana, which underpins its approach to quantum computing.

Read source

IBM introduces Qiskit Paulice addon for postselected quantum error correction on near-term hardware

IBM has introduced Qiskit Paulice, a new Qiskit addon designed to improve the reliability of quantum circuits by embedding spacetime Pauli checks for error detection without significant overhead. The tool allows users to detect and filter out errors during circuit execution, enabling postselected error correction, particularly suited for near-term hardware and Clifford or Clifford-dominated circuits. Recent experiments, including a Quantum Advantage Tracker submission in partnership with the University of Chicago, have demonstrated the practical benefits of these methods for scaling quantum computations.

Read source

Chicago Quantum Exchange forecasts Midwest quantum job market may reach 191,000 within a decade

The University of Chicago Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering, in partnership with Quantum Machines and the Chicago Quantum Exchange, has piloted a workforce development program to prepare community college students for emerging quantum engineering roles. According to a recent Chicago Quantum Exchange report, the Midwest quantum job market could reach 191,000 positions within a decade, highlighting the urgent need to train skilled technicians and engineers for this rapidly expanding sector. Seven City Colleges of Chicago students gained hands-on experience with Quantum Machines’ OPX+ controller, learning to execute quantum control experiments essential for research and industry.

Read source

Qilimanjaro integrates NVIDIA CUDA-Q to add GPU acceleration in latest QiliSDK upgrade

CUDA-Q now powers GPU emulation inside QiliSDK, extending Qilimanjaro’s unique multimodal approach across classical and quantum backends, from CPU and GPU to analog and digital QPUs. QiliSDK is Qilimanjaro’s Python framework for developing, running and emulating both digital and analog quantum algorithms.
Read source

Infleqtion launches America’s Quantum Space Initiative with industry and academic partners to advance quantum-enabled space technologies

Infleqtion (NYSE: INFQ) has launched America’s Quantum Space Initiative, partnering with Voyager Technologies, Monarch Quantum, Armada, and the University of Colorado Boulder as founding innovators. The initiative aims to accelerate the advancement and deployment of quantum technologies for future space systems, supporting national security, scientific discovery, and economic competitiveness. Near-term plans include convening sector leaders, establishing the Hub, and identifying deployment opportunities, with the long-term objective of securing U.S.

Read source

Bull and Alice & Bob sign agreement to integrate quantum computing into high-performance computing systems

Bull and Alice & Bob have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to deepen their collaboration in research, product innovation, software, and commercial development aimed at integrating quantum computers into high-performance computing (HPC) environments. The partnership focuses on advancing quantum applications in material physics, strengthening software support for cat qubits, and accelerating the integration of Alice & Bob’s fault-tolerant quantum computing technology with Bull’s HPC systems. The initiative aims to drive the deployment of hybrid HPC-quantum infrastructures, initially targeting the European market, including France, the UK, and Germany, reflecting a shared ambition to scale quantum technologies for industrial, research, and public-sector use.

Read source

QCentroid launches QuantumOps to streamline hybrid quantum-classical workflows with expert agents

QCentroid’s QuantumOps provides an operational framework for enterprise hybrid quantum-classical workflows, focusing on reproducibility, comparability, and governance from business problem to benchmark. By integrating expert quantum agents—covering stages from use-case formation to benchmark interpretation—within a managed lifecycle, teams can translate business objectives into reproducible quantum experiments. The platform, built atop NVIDIA CUDA-Q, enables code portability across GPU-accelerated simulators and quantum processing units, capturing exhaustive experiment metadata for consistent benchmarking.

Read source

Taiyi Quantum Technology raises 300 million yuan to advance ytterbium neutral-atom quantum computer commercialization

Taiyi Quantum Technology Co., Ltd. (Shanghai), also known as Taiyi Liangsheng, has completed a 300 million yuan ($44 million USD) strategic financing round, bringing its total funding since January 2026 to over 400 million yuan ($59 million USD). The late-stage round, co-led by Gaorong Ventures and IDG Capital and joined by major domestic and industrial investors, aims to commercialize neutral-atom quantum computers using ytterbium (171Yb) as the physical qubit.

Read source

Donald Trump signs executive orders to accelerate U.S. quantum computing development and cybersecurity migration

President Donald Trump ordered a push on Monday to build a powerful quantum computer for ​scientific research and speed efforts to protect government systems from ‌related cyber threats, bolstering U.S. “We believe this can happen by 2028,” ​Michael Kratsios, director of the White House Office of Science ​and Technology Policy, said in a call previewing the moves ⁠and referring to the quantum computer. Efforts in its race with China for a technology that could upend science and cybersecurity.

Read source

United States President issues executive order to advance quantum information science and accelerate commercialization

Presidential Actions USHERING IN THE NEXT FRONTIER OF QUANTUM INNOVATION Executive Orders June 22, 2026 Executive Order 14413 By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered: Section 1 . In 2018, I laid the foundation for United States leadership in QIST by signing into law the National Quantum Initiative Act and doubling Federal investment in QIST research and development. Today, as other nations move quickly to challenge American leadership, the United States must take a cohesive, whole-of-government approach to accelerate deployment and commercialization of quantum computing, sensing, and networking.

Read source

U.S. Department of Energy launches Quantum Genesis initiative to develop and deploy the first scientifically relevant fault-tolerant quantum computers by 2028

To help shape this strategic effort, DOE recently sought community input through a Request for Information (RFI) on Scientifically Relevant Fault-Tolerant Quantum Computing Systems , underscoring the United States’ commitment to leadership in quantum information science. “The Quantum Genesis initiative is the first step in delivering on President Trump’s charge for a national effort in developing a quantum computer powerful enough for scientific research,” said Michael Kratsios, Assistant to the President and Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

Read source

U.S. federal initiatives position International Business Machines and IonQ as leading domestic quantum computing companies

Federal executive orders have designated sovereign quantum dominance as a national security priority to accelerate domestic technology leadership. The establishment of a dedicated commercial foundry secures a reliable domestic hardware supply chain for superconducting silicon technologies. Proprietary hardware innovations and strategic acquisitions are positioning pure-play developer firms to capture rapid commercial and defense growth.

Read source

Classiq and Amazon Web Services develop hybrid quantum-classical chemistry workflow with Hatch in Singapore

AWS Quantum Technologies Blog Classiq and AWS Power Quantum-Classical Chemistry Innovation in Singapore with Hatch Introduction In biochemical processes development and analysis, binding energy, the energy released when a small molecule docks into a protein’s active site, determines how strongly a compound, such as a ligand, interacts with its protein target. The calculations were conducted on AWS cloud infrastructure using Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) on a c6i.16xlarge instance with 64 vCPUs and 128 GB of memory. The result is a workflow that uses AWS resources to handle the heavy classical computation and quantum computing to account for quantum correlations in the calculations, increasing accuracy beyond what DFT alone provides.

Read source

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Surface Codes

Latest strip published June 21, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

The surface code is the most widely studied quantum error correction scheme, and for good reason: it has a high error threshold (approximately 1% for standard noise models), meaning it can tolerate relatively noisy physical qubits compared to other codes. The post Surface Codes first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

D-Wave Advantage2 quantum computer mines cryptocurrency on Quip blockchain with significantly less energy than conventional computers

The Advantage2 quantum processing unit D-Wave A quantum computer is successfully mining cryptocurrency in the first experiment of its kind, while also using a lot less energy, researchers have claimed. While most of the computers participating in the Quip blockchain are conventional machines, the network also includes an Advantage2 computer built by D-Wave Quantum – and it seems to be beating the ordinary computers. Notably, in 2024, the firm claimed that one of its quantum computers had solved a problem that would otherwise be impossible for even a conventional supercomputer, but a different team of researchers reported performing a similar computation on a normal laptop just a year later.

Read source

D-Wave Quantum announces forthcoming gate-model quantum simulator with error-aware programming and future access requests

Enter the Era of Error-Aware Quantum Development D-Wave’s forthcoming gate model quantum computing simulator will combine error detection with real-time control and can help developers prototype novel error-aware applications, model quantum processor behavior, and explore advanced error correction approaches based on dual-rail qubits.

Read source

MIT and University of Ferrara researchers develop mathematical framework for designing distinguishable non-Gaussian quantum states

MIT and University of Ferrara researchers have developed a new mathematical framework to improve the distinguishability of quantum states—a key requirement for quantum sensing, communication, and computing. Their approach, detailed in Physical Review A, translates quantum states of light into algebraic varieties, enabling the precise design of non-Gaussian quantum states that are easier to differentiate. The team’s theory utilizes photon addition and subtraction operations, which create non-Gaussian states already producible in experiments.

Read source

Researchers and industry partners analyze energy demands and efficiency strategies for scaling quantum computers

Scaling up quantum computing, and the energy it would take to do so, is an emerging topic in scientific circles. The cooling system accounted for approximately 80% of the power consumption of a noisy intermediate-scale superconducting quantum computer, according to a May preprint from a group of quantum computing researchers.

Read source

Passive quantum error correction doubles qubit lifetime, reaching break-even point

A team of U.S. researchers has designed a passive quantum error correction technique that enables qubits to correct their own errors. Demonstrated by Shruti Shirol and colleagues at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, the protocol transforms the inevitable dissipation of energy in qubit systems from a hindrance into an advantage, offering a promising route toward practical quantum computing outside the lab. The research has been published in Physical Review X.

Read source

Quantum hyperdimensional computing can work 500 times faster than other methods

Cleveland Clinic researchers are unlocking quantum computing's full potential through the creation of a new computing paradigm inspired by the human brain. Fabio Cumbo, Ph.D., research associate in the lab of Daniel Blankenberg, Ph.D., associate staff, Computational Life Sciences, is developing the model, called quantum hyperdimensional computing (QHDC). Hyperdimensional computing is a type of computing based in neuroscience. It follows the idea that a concept in the brain is not stored on one single neuron. For example, when you think of a cat, there is no single neuron in your brain solely responsible for knowing what a cat is. That information is spread across thousands or millions of neurons, so if one neuron fails, you still remember what a cat is.

Read source

IQM Deploys Its First U.S. Quantum Computer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Pathfinder, a 20-qubit IQM Radiance system, is now operational at the home of Frontier, the world’s most powerful supercomputer for open science. It’s ORNL’s first commercially procured quantum computer and IQM’s first system on U.S. soil. It will be connected to high-performance computing systems in the National Center for Computational Sciences Technology Integration Group’s test bed. ORNL owns and operates the system on its own campus. IQM’s deployment model gives customers direct ownership and control of their quantum infrastructure, including the IP. IQM has sold 23 full-stack quantum systems worldwide, more on-premises systems than any other manufacturer.

Read source

Quantinuum unveils Helios, a 98-qubit trapped-ion quantum computer with all-to-all connectivity

Quantinuum’s Helios is a 98-qubit trapped-ion quantum computer utilizing barium-137 ions and the quantum charge-coupled device (QCCD) architecture, featuring all-to-all qubit connectivity via a rotatable ion storage ring and an X-junction. With high two-qubit gate fidelities of 99.92% and scalable laser architecture, Helios advances the state-of-the-art in trapped-ion systems. Its architecture allows efficient parallelized operations, with an average infidelity of 7.9 × 10⁻⁴ for two-qubit gates and 2.5 × 10⁻⁵ for single-qubit gates. System benchmarks, including random circuit sampling, demonstrate Helios’ performance beyond classical simulation, establishing a new frontier for quantum computers.

Read source

Sandia National Laboratories and Quantinuum demonstrate 99.9% average two-qubit gate fidelity on Helios trapped-ion quantum system—serious hardware steps, hype free

Ppublic-private partnership in the Mountain West announced today new results that mark steady progress toward the Department of Energy’s goal of fault-tolerant quantum computing, systems large and reliable enough to solve complex problems.

Sandia National Laboratories photonics researcher Forrest Hubert aligns an experimental chip with an optical waveguide carrying laser light. Sandia collaborates with quantum computing company Quantinuum to develop and test similar technologies. Photo credit: Craig Fritz.

Sandia National Laboratories, home to the DOE’s longest running quantum computing program, and tech company Quantinuum published a paper today in the scientific journal Nature that reports the performance of the company’s 98-qubit commercial system, Helios

Read source

[PAPER] Duke University team automates VQE experiments on trapped-ion quantum computer—60,000 circuits run, 60% runtime cut, and 71% correlation energy recovered pre-quantum; serious workflow upgrade for academic labs, but hardware remains the bottleneck

Academic quantum computing platforms often face unique challenges in executing quantum workloads due to fragmented software environments and limited engineering support. The system successfully executed over 60,000 circuits across multiple molecular test cases with minimal human intervention, highlighting the framework’s effectiveness in enabling reproducible, resilient quantum experimentation in academic settings. Among the most promising of these is the variational quantum algorithm (VQA), a hybrid classical-quantum heuristic that operates on noisy gate-based quantum computers 5 , 6 , 7.

Read source

Origin Wukong quantum computer in China completes over 1 million computing tasks and demonstrates post-quantum cryptography framework

China’s Origin Wukong superconducting quantum computer, developed by OriginQC, has surpassed 1 million completed computing tasks, according to the Anhui Provincial Key Laboratory of Quantum Computing Chips and the Anhui Quantum Computing Engineering Research Center. Origin Wukong has been operational for over two years, serving users from more than 192 countries, and its PQC framework is being deployed across Chinese enterprises and public institutions. Notably, the system has also demonstrated China’s first post-quantum cryptography (PQC) protection framework, Origin Rock, designed to safeguard against both quantum and classical attacks.

Read source

Quobly raises €115 million Series A funding to industrialize silicon-based quantum computers

Quobly has announced the closing of a EUR115 million Series A financing to accelerate the industrialization of its silicon-based quantum computers and bring its first commercial product to market by the end of 2026, the French quantum computing company said.

Read source

Anhui Quantum Computing Engineering Research Center announces dual computing and security capabilities for Origin Wukong superconducting quantum computer

China’s domestically developed ‘Origin Wukong’ superconducting quantum computer has executed over 1 million quantum computing tasks with users globally and now integrates a post-quantum cryptography (PQC) framework, creating dual strengths in computational power and security. According to the Anhui Provincial Key Laboratory of Quantum Computing Chips and the Anhui Quantum Computing Engineering Research Center, the ‘Origin Wukong’ series has operated stably for over two years, receiving more than 49 million remote visits from 192 countries and regions. In April 2024, it launched China’s first PQC ‘anti-quantum attack shield,’ Origin Rock, capable of resisting both quantum and classical cyberattacks and already deployed across various enterprises and public institutions.

Read source

QuEra Computing announces Libra fault-tolerant quantum computer for 2028 and expands multi-year strategic collaboration with Amazon Web Services

QuEra Computing announced its first fault-tolerant quantum computer, Libra, which will be available via Amazon Braket in 2028 as part of an expanded multi-year partnership with AWS. Libra is designed as a megaquop-class system capable of executing around one million reliable logical quantum operations, with over 256 error-corrected logical qubits and a logical error rate of 10⁻⁶. This system aims to enable early commercial and research quantum workflows in fields such as molecular simulation and materials discovery.

Read source

Alice & Bob lands French government deal to deploy 100-qubit cat-qubit system at GENCI supercomputing center

Following the announcements made by the President of the French Republic on May 22 at the CEA’s Très Grand Centre de Calcul (TGCC) regarding the second phase of France’s National Quantum Strategy (SNQ), GENCI (Grand Équipement National de Calcul Intensif) and French quantum computing company Alice & Bob signed an agreement at VivaTech on June 17, in the presence of representatives of the French government, for France’s acquisition of an 18-cat-qubit quantum computer.

Read source

Atom Computing and Nu Quantum announce partnership to develop scalable, photonic-networked quantum computers

Atom Computing and Nu Quantum have announced a strategic partnership to develop scalable, utility-scale quantum computers by integrating Atom Computing’s neutral-atom quantum processors with Nu Quantum’s photonic networking hardware. The collaboration, formalized by a Memorandum of Understanding, focuses on technologies such as integrated photonics network switches, qubit-photon entanglement, and distributed fault-tolerant architectures. Atom Computing recently demonstrated progress with quantum error correction and notable contracts, while Nu Quantum raised a record $60 million Series A round for quantum networking.

Read source

IonQ launches Clavis XG Multiplex to enable scalable quantum security deployment on metropolitan fiber networks

IonQ has announced Clavis XG Multiplex, a new product within its Clavis XG Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) portfolio aimed at enabling the practical deployment of quantum security across metropolitan fiber networks. The solution allows simultaneous quantum and classical data transmission over existing infrastructure without redesigning networks, thereby reducing costs and facilitating enterprise-grade integration. IonQ positions this release as a step forward in scalable, real-world quantum security deployment for organizations handling sensitive data.

Read source

INNOSPACE and Norma agree to jointly demonstrate quantum computing hardware in orbit

INNOSPACE, a South Korean satellite launch provider, has signed an MOU with local quantum computing firm Norma to enable in-orbit quantum hardware demonstrations and lay foundations for a Space Quantum Computing Center. The initiative involves integrating Norma’s compact Quantum Processing Unit (QPU) payload directly onto INNOSPACE’s HANBIT rocket for testing under harsh space conditions. The operational data from these flights will inform the development of a cloud-linked infrastructure hub dedicated to quantum-enhanced satellite operations.

Read source

Quantum Computing Inc. and Planck Dynamics sign framework agreement for NeuraWave photonic reservoir computer deployment in AI applications

QCi has entered into a framework agreement with Planck Dynamics, backed by NUNC Capital BV, to deploy its NeuraWave photonic reservoir computer as a foundational platform for next-generation AI applications. The initial order comprises five NeuraWave systems, with potential for up to 100 units and a total value exceeding $10 million, contingent on milestone achievements.

Read source

Amazon executive Peter DeSantis predicts first commercially useful quantum computers in five to seven years

Amazon’s top AI executive, Peter DeSantis, forecasts that the first ‘commercially useful’ small-scale quantum computers will emerge within five to seven years. Amazon recently made advances in error correction with its Ocelot quantum chip, and DeSantis’ estimate positions Amazon mid-range among industry peers’ predictions. DeSantis told CNBC that after this breakthrough, the technology will scale rapidly, likening its growth to Moore’s Law.

Read source

AIX Global Innovations demonstrates fault-tolerant quantum computing with chemical accuracy across molecules on IBM Heron quantum processors

This paper reports the first end-to-end fault-tolerant quantum computing stack to clear all four strict-FTQC requirements simultaneously on commodity superconducting NISQ silicon, rented through standard IBM Quantum cloud subscription with no purpose-built research machine, no custom decoder, and no magic-state distillation factory. The four requirements: (i) surface-code quantum error correction at distance d≥3 with logical-error rate below the unencoded baseline; (ii) a universal Clifford+T gate set executed via magic-state injection, with no arbitrary angle physical rotation carrying non-Clifford content on the wire (the algorithm-determined non-Clifford angle never fires on the silicon; the native RZ(θphys) on Heron fires only at Clifford-multiple angles required to compose H, S, T); (iii) heterogeneous primitive composition (teleportation, lattice-surgery CNOT, T-gate, logical memory) on a persistent encoded register; and (iv) runtime admissibility verification on every committed result. All five chips, five chemistry workloads spanning four molecules, and twenty-two governed runs in this paper were executed on the same primitive engine without architectural change.

Read source

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Fault Tolerant Computing

Latest strip published June 14, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

A fault-tolerant quantum computer is a machine that can perform arbitrarily long calculations even though its underlying components are unreliable. In a classical computer, transistors rarely fail, but quantum bits are entirely different. Regardless of the underlying hardware platform, physical The post Fault Tolerant Computing first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

University of Washington scientists use artificial intelligence and quantum computing to accelerate quantum materials discovery

University of Washington materials scientists have harnessed artificial intelligence and quantum computing to accelerate the discovery and simulation of quantum materials. In two studies, the team demonstrated that AI can rapidly model large, complex stacks of molybdenum ditelluride sheets, revealing quantum behaviors absent at smaller scales, while quantum computers excel at simulating phenomena like the Laughlin state. The work is changing how materials research is conducted, enabling breakthroughs previously thought impossible.

Read source

Xanadu Quantum Technologies achieves record-low edge-coupling loss in photonic chip packaging

Xanadu today announced a new accomplishment in ultra-low loss photonic chip packaging, achieving ultra-low edge-coupling loss for its photonic chips. Xanadu has successfully demonstrated an average 0.085 dB/facet edge-coupling loss, a critical metric for the feasibility and performance of photonic quantum computers. About Xanadu Founded in 2016, Xanadu is a Canadian photonic quantum computing company with the mission to build quantum computers that are useful and available to people everywhere.

Read source

Microsoft and Quantinuum achieve up to 800x reduction in logical qubit error rates using error correction on trapped-ion hardware

Microsoft and Quantinuum have demonstrated a substantial advance in quantum error correction using trapped-ion qubits, as detailed in a new Nature publication. By applying Microsoft’s quantum platform to Quantinuum’s hardware, they achieved logical error-rate reductions from 11x to 800x over physical baselines, including an 800x improvement in Bell-state preparation. Their work also achieved a 51x reduction per round in repeated error correction and a 22x improvement in preparing a 12-qubit cat state.

Read source

IBM releases open-source ffsim library to accelerate and validate fermionic quantum circuit simulations

IBM has introduced ffsim, an open-source Python library designed to accelerate prototyping and benchmarking of fermionic quantum circuits. Benchmarks show ffsim is up to 11× faster than FQE for certain workloads and can simulate large systems, such as a 64-qubit 2D Hubbard model, using dramatically less memory. By leveraging symmetries inherent in fermionic systems, such as total particle number and spin conservation, ffsim drastically reduces simulation cost and memory requirements compared to general-purpose simulators.

Read source

Pasqal inaugurates Italy’s first neutral-atom quantum computer at CINECA

Pasqal has inaugurated Italy’s first neutral-atom quantum computer, named SOL, at CINECA in Bologna—marking the third deployment of a Pasqal system in Europe. The Orion QPU features 140 qubits and is integrated with the EuroHPC Leonardo supercomputer, enabling hybrid quantum-classical workflows through established HPC scheduling and interfaces. This milestone, co-funded by the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking and Italy’s Ministry of University and Research, signals a significant advance in Europe’s quantum computing infrastructure.

Read source

Google declines to join Trump administration’s $2 billion quantum computing initiative due to speed concerns

Google is staying out of President Donald Trump’s $2 billion quantum computing funding initiative, and the decision could say as much about speed as it does about strategy. Speaking at the Semafor Tech Summit in San Francisco on June 10, Google Quantum AI COO Charina Chou said Google declined to join because various conditions that came with the funding could have slowed the company’s push to build a practical quantum computer. Chou added that Google still works with Washington in other ways and supports more funding for basic quantum research.

Read source

University of Tennessee Knoxville announces plan for 100,000-square-foot quantum accelerator facility

The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, is the latest major institution to announce an investment in new quantum research infrastructure, with plans to build a 100,000-square-foot facility and hire new faculty members to establish a regional quantum hub in Knoxville. In addition to personnel investments, the initiative includes plans for a 100,000-square-foot quantum foundry at UT Research Park and another quantum computing hub in Knoxville’s Maplehurst Innovation District.

Read source

Why Quantum Computing Companies Are Turning to SPACs

Great article from TQI on why SPACs are the chosen vehicle for most Quantum companies.

Read source

IQM Finland Oy and Real Asset Acquisition Corp. secure upsized USD 146 million PIPE with new commitment from Ilmarinen

IQM Quantum Computers and Real Asset Acquisition Corp. (RAAQ) announced the upsizing of their PIPE financing to over USD 146 million, following a new investment from Ilmarinen, Finland’s largest private earnings-related pension insurance company. The capital will fund IQM’s technology and commercial efforts towards fault-tolerant quantum computing.

Read source

Silicon Quantum Computing receives 40 million AUD from National Reconstruction Fund Corporation to expand quantum chip production

SQC Secures Additional Funding for Quantum Chip Production secures 40 million AUD for quantum chip production expansion from the National Reconstruction Fund Corporation. The total investment from the government investment fund in the company has reached 60 million Australian dollars.

Read source

Alice & Bob launches Helium platform to accelerate quantum error correction and logical qubit research for superconducting cat qubits

A&B unveiled the Helium Quantum System, marking the company’s expansion from developing cat-qubit chips to delivering a complete quantum computing system for on-premise deployment. The Helium Quantum System has been engineered to encode Alice & Bob’s first logical qubit with as few as 18 cat-qubits. From the processor architecture to the cabling, control electronics and software stack, the entire system is optimized for quantum error correction. Designed as an upgradeable platform, the quantum system will also support the next 48 cat-qubit chip on Alice & Bob’s roadmap – expected to feature multiple logical qubits.

Read source

Nokia launches Deepfield Genome Shield and announces partnerships for quantum-safe key distribution and AI-enabled 5G modernization

Nokia is working with Indosat Ooredoo Hutchison and NVIDIA to modernize Indonesia’s 5G networks using AI centric technologies. The company has partnered with Quantropi to work on carrier grade, quantum safe key distribution for future resistant networking.

Read source

Arkeon Technologies raises €594.2k seed funding to enhance precision in quantum chip production

Arkeon Technologies, a DeepTech startup from Gothenburg, has secured a €594.2k (SEK 6.5 million) Seed round from Chalmers Ventures, Navigare Ventures, and Almi Invest to enhance its technology for producing precision superconducting quantum chips. Founded in 2025 by Peter Hörstedt, Andreas Nylander, and Marcus Rommel, Arkeon develops a post-fabrication method to finely tune qubit frequencies, aiming to improve chip accuracy, quality, and yield without requiring a redesign of the manufacturing process. The company has secured letters of intent from several potential customers and maintains a pipeline of around 30 interested companies, signaling strong early market interest.

Read source

Italy launches National Quantum Strategy and invests over €140 million to develop quantum technology ecosystem

Italy’s quantum technology sector has rapidly developed, fueled by over €140 million in National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP) funding (2023–2025) and the establishment of two key institutions: the National Center for HPC, Big Data and Quantum Computing and NQSTI. In 2025, a National Quantum Strategy was launched, reflecting interministerial coordination, although actual budget allocations and measurable goals lag behind peers like Germany and France. The industrial quantum ecosystem is young, with strengths in quantum communication, photonics, and a growing presence of international firms (IQM, Pasqal).

Read source

Colt Technology Services and Ciena complete quantum-safe data transmission trial across transatlantic network

Colt Technology Services and Ciena have completed a successful trial of quantum-safe data transmission over a transatlantic route, protecting live data across 6,900 kilometers of Colt’s subsea and terrestrial network between New York and London. The trial demonstrated secure transmission at an 800 Gb Ethernet service rate using Ciena’s WaveLogic 6 Extreme encryption, which features Module-Lattice-Based Key-Encapsulation Mechanism (ML-KEM) algorithms, recently standardized by NIST, and Quantum Key Distribution interworking. The effort addresses growing concerns over quantum computing potentially breaking current encryption by 2030 and safeguards high-value data transmitted via subsea cables.

Read source

Horizon Quantum Announces Dublin as Its Second Quantum Computer Testbed Location, Bringing A Frontier Quantum System to Ireland

Horizon Quantum infrastructure for quantum applications, today announced that it expects to locate its second quantum computer—anticipated to be one of the most advanced commercial quantum systems in the world—in Dublin, Ireland. By placing this IonQ 256-qubit system at its European headquarters, Horizon Quantum aims to benefit from Ireland’s growing quantum ecosystem, strong university network, and robust talent pool for deep-tech development, both within the country and across the EU.

Read source

IQM Quantum Computers unveils barbell quantum error-correcting codes to reduce hardware complexity for fault-tolerant quantum computing

Unlike many alternative high-performance quantum error-correction approaches, the new code also maintains a comparatively low hardware complexity, marking a significant advancement toward scalable fault-tolerant quantum computing. Quantum error correction remains one of the defining challenges in the race toward practical quantum computing. IQM’s breakthrough technology, called barbell codes, is a family of quantum low-density parity-check (QLDPC) codes tailored to IQM’s Constellation, a unique quantum processor topology with enhanced planar connectivity where each qubit can natively interact to 12 other qubits.

Read source

(This time AI made a gorgeous job on the summary image innit?)

Superfast quantum memory, precise virus-sized nanomagnets, and the latest chips and IPOs—let’s separate the credible signal from this week’s quantum computing sector noise. The action starts in the lab, where Zhejiang University researchers claimed a headline-ready “world’s first superfast quantum random access memory.” The experiment, described as a direct strike at the Achilles’ heel of quantum acceleration (that pesky data access bottleneck), promises quantum hardware that doesn’t choke on classical inputs. The Chinese team gave the usual justification—faster QRAM unlocks quantum algorithms’ theoretical speed-ups for tasks like drug discovery—but this one lands with more weight, since every serious architecture builder is stuck with this bottleneck. From hardware fundamental to hardware cleverness: the Virginia Commonwealth University group, led by Jayasimha Atulasimha, showed off diamond qubits paired with nanomagnets roughly 200 nanometers across. The premise: swap electromagnetic monster trucks for virus-sized actuators, enabling accurate quantum state control via acoustic waves. Less space, less energy, and, crucially, a plausible path to scaling. The work’s in Nature Communications, so the engineering is more than hand-waving. Sprinting over to photonics, QuiX Quantum installed its real-time Feed-Forward Control Unit—think rack-mounted, FPGA-driven, 150-nanosecond-latency brains—for their universal photonic quantum computer. The company frames this as a “significant advance” as it moves toward delivery of its first commercial machine. If you’re tracking hardware readiness for industrial or scientific use, this ticks a box nobody should ignore. Meanwhile, in more sobering news for quantum advantage proponents, researchers led by Roman Rausch published new high-precision classical simulations cutting into previous claims of quantum supremacy. This is the obligatory cold shower for anyone still confusing “quantum” with “unbeatable.” On to the money. Quantum Machines and Rigetti Computing report a technical milestone: 99.5% median two-qubit gate fidelity on Rigetti’s Novera quantum processor, driven by the OPX1000 hardware platform and QUAlibrate software. Not only did errors stay low across the QPU, but the setup’s automated calibration and monitoring are already out in the wild at sites like Fermilab and Horizon Quantum. Here is the important part: this is concrete engineering, prime for organizations serious about scale. The industrial chessboard is shifting quickly. Oxford Quantum Circuits secured a $350 million Series C, breaking private quantum raise records in Europe and giving OQC enough dry powder for more international expansion and data center deployments. C12, on the other end of the pipeline, rolled out a “Pick & Place” nanoassembly method for carbon nanotube quantum chips—replacing a glacial, year-long process with a semi-automated production line good for 50 devices in four weeks. Takeaway: whoever solves reproducible, high-volume quantum chip assembly first wins a chunk of the hardware future. If you want to see where real money is betting, Quantinuum grabbed $1.68 billion in a U.S. IPO, off the back of strong investor appetite. The company’s bookings are picking up, but, as the reporting notes, product maturity remains a work in progress. Finally, the press release fog rolls in from Microsoft, with the unveiling of the Majorana 2 quantum chip at Build in San Francisco. Here’s where the signals get fragile. The material switch—lead instead of aluminum, indium arsenide plus indium arsenide antimonide—allegedly brings qubits with 1,000x the reliability and a mean life of 20 seconds. Microsoft now says it’s halved its timeline and eyes a practical, fault-tolerant quantum computer by 2029. Impressive science. Dubious timeline. As always, “practical” remains undefined, and the world will want to see error correction, not just longer-lived qubits. Zoom out: The real game is this—controlled experiments, reliable hardware, automated calibration, and volume manufacturing are starting to converge. Glitzy IPOs and chip demos are noise until they ship products that can actually chew on real workloads. This week, the ecosystem flexed credible science, meaningful technical milestones, and some sharp industrial moves. The implication (backed by multiple stories): Quantum hardware and engineering are moving—slowly, unevenly—toward manufacturable scale. For those counting, that’s real signal in a sea of theater.

What is a logical qubit anyways?

Alice & Bob share their answer in a great paper this week

🏴‍☠️ The Great Logical Qubit Heist: Alice & Bob Want to End Quantum Marketin

One of the most abused terms in quantum computing today is the phrase "logical qubit." Every few months, another company announces a shiny new logical qubit. Investors cheer. Press releases fly. LinkedIn fills with rocket emojis. The problem? Not all logical qubits are created equal.

This week, French quantum startup Alice & Bob released a surprisingly useful paper: "Defining the Logical Qubit: Five Criteria to Benchmark Logical Qubit Claims." Instead of announcing a new record, they ask a more uncomfortable question: «What exactly qualifies as a logical qubit in the first place?»

Their answer is essentially a pirate's checklist for separating genuine progress from marketing treasure maps.

1. Breakeven: Is the cure better than the disease?

A logical qubit should outperform the physical qubits used to build it. If your error-corrected qubit is actually noisier than the underlying hardware, congratulations: you've invented a very expensive problem. Alice & Bob argue that true breakeven means error correction delivers a measurable improvement, not just a demonstration that the code executes.

2. Persistence: Does it stay alive longer?

A logical qubit should preserve information longer than a physical qubit. This sounds obvious, but many demonstrations focus on isolated metrics while the encoded information doesn't actually survive significantly longer. The whole point of error correction is extending quantum memory. If it doesn't, you're basically putting armor on a pirate ship that still sinks faster than a rowboat.

3. Scalability: Can it grow?

A logical qubit that works only in a carefully crafted laboratory setup is interesting science. A logical qubit that can be replicated thousands or millions of times is useful engineering. The paper stresses that logical qubits must demonstrate a credible path toward larger code distances and larger systems. Otherwise, they are scientific curiosities rather than building blocks.

4. Operability: Can you actually compute with it?

A memory is not a computer. Logical qubits need logical operations, logical gates, measurements, initialization, and all the machinery required to execute algorithms. A perfectly protected qubit that cannot participate in fault-tolerant computation is like owning the world's safest treasure chest without a key.

5. Resource Efficiency: How much treasure does it consume? This may be the most important criterion of all. If creating one useful logical qubit requires millions of physical qubits, the architecture may never become economically relevant. Alice & Bob argue that hardware overhead matters as much as logical performance. A practical quantum computer isn't just about achieving fault tolerance—it's about achieving it at a scale humans can afford.

The Pirate Take

This paper is less about Alice & Bob's cat qubits and more about bringing discipline to a field that desperately needs common definitions. The quantum industry is entering a new phase where simply counting physical qubits is no longer enough. I other words: get out of the lab and your quantum supremacy claims and show me business testable, provable value added into the industry. Not point solutions isolated that break down when added into a true enterprise pipeline. A&B has always taking such approach, from their cats, their marketing and publications (and that's why I love their work).

So, on logical qubit the real question becomes: How really good are those qubits? Alice & Bob's five criteria provide a useful benchmark for investors, customers, and quantum enthusiasts trying to navigate an increasingly noisy sea of announcements. The era of "we built a logical qubit" is ending. The era of proving that your logical qubit actually matters has begun. (Link to paper below 👇)

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Laser Cooling

Latest strip published June 7, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

Atoms at room temperature move at hundreds of meters per second, far too fast to serve as qubits. To use individual atoms for quantum computing, scientists must slow them almost to a standstill. Laser cooling is the primary technique for The post Laser Cooling first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

[PAPER] Fuzhou University team fuses quantum circuits with spiking networks for anomaly detection—98.7% accuracy on MVTec benchmark, but drops to 88.9% without decoherence controls; impressive numbers, fragile guts

Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) anomaly detection imposes concurrent requirements for temporal consistency, computational latency control, and representation of high-dimensional heterogeneous sensor data. When tested on the MVTec Anomaly Detection dataset, the model achieves classification accuracy of 98.7% with 512 logical quantum–spiking units and an inference time of 3.29 s. The effect of each component is estimated via ablation study – eliminating the Quantum Neurons for Sensor Data Fusion module leads to classification accuracy of 92.5%, whereas elimination of the Quantum Decoherence Management for Reliable Processing module produces the lowest classification accuracy of 88.9%.

Read source

[PAPER] Microsoft claims parity-stabilized Majorana chip hits 20-second quantum state lifetime—evidence climbs, but functional qubits remain MIA

Majorana 2 is Microsoft’s latest topological quantum computer chip. The chip, called Majorana 2, is an updated version of the highly controversial Majorana 1 chip that was unveiled last year . The paper, which is yet to be peer reviewed, reports that the chip’s qubits — a quantum computer’s equivalent of a computer’s bits — are able to hold information for more than 20 seconds, which is 1,000 times longer than the qubits in its predecessor.

Read source

Microsoft unveils Majorana 2 quantum computing chip and sets goal for practical quantum computer by 2029

At its Build conference in San Francisco, Microsoft unveiled its next-generation quantum computing chip, Majorana 2. The chip features significant material improvements over the previous Majorana 1, using lead instead of aluminum for its superconductor and a combination of indium arsenide and indium arsenide antimonide in the semiconductor region, resulting in qubits that are claimed to be 1,000 times more reliable and with a mean lifetime of 20 seconds. Chetan Nayak stated that this progress has enabled Microsoft to halve its timeline and target the release of a practical, fault-tolerant quantum computer by 2029.

Read source

Virginia Commonwealth University researchers develop nanomagnet-based technique to control quantum bits

Researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University, led by engineering professor Jayasimha Atulasimha, have advanced quantum computing hardware by using nanomagnets as small as viruses to control the spin of electrons in diamond-based qubits. Their study, published in Nature Communications, demonstrates that pairing these 200-nanometer-wide magnets with diamond qubits enables precise quantum state control using acoustic waves. This technique could reduce the space and energy required for quantum computing hardware, improving scalability and potential for real-world application.

Read source

Alice & Bob publish definition of a logical qubit paper

One of the most abused terms in quantum computing today is the phrase "logical qubit."

Every few months, another company announces a shiny new logical qubit. Investors cheer. Press releases fly. LinkedIn fills with rocket emojis. The problem? Not all logical qubits are created equal.

This week, French quantum startup Alice & Bob released a surprisingly useful paper: "Defining the Logical Qubit: Five Criteria to Benchmark Logical Qubit Claims." Instead of announcing a new record, they ask a more uncomfortable question: what exactly qualifies as a logical qubit anyways?

Read source

QuiX Quantum installs real-time Feed-Forward Control Unit for universal photonic quantum computer

QuiX Quantum has announced the installation of its Feed-Forward Control Unit (FFCU), a real-time controller designed for its universal photonic quantum computing architecture. The rack-mounted FFCU system features two FPGA modules, 32 inputs/outputs, and a latency of approximately 150 nanoseconds. The installation marks a significant advance for QuiX Quantum as it prepares to deliver its first-generation universal quantum computer, aiming to support a broad set of quantum algorithms for scientific and industrial applications.

Read source

Zhejiang University team creates world’s first superfast quantum memory for quantum computers

Chinese scientists from Zhejiang University have developed the world’s first superfast quantum random access memory (QRAM), addressing a crucial bottleneck for quantum computers by providing efficient access to classical data. The new quantum memory is expected to significantly accelerate tasks involving massive data processing, which is essential for applications like drug discovery and fraud detection. The QRAM breakthrough is identified as a core advancement required for general-purpose quantum computing, enabling quantum algorithms to achieve their theoretical speed-ups.

Read source

Quantum error correction with the toric code by Atom Computing

Quantum computing platforms based on arrays of tweezer-confined neutral atoms have recently emerged as a competitive modality thanks to a direct path toward high qubit count, rapidly advancing operation fidelities, and their ability to execute circuits with arbitrary qubit connectivity. These features will enable the use of efficient error correction schemes with high encoding-rates, time-efficient decoding, and resource-efficient architectures based on transversal gates. With these goals in mind, recent state of the art neutral atom demonstrations focus on the transition from the use of physical qubits to error-corrected logical qubits, but to date there has been no demonstration of repeated error correction scalable to arbitrary depth. Here, we demonstrate many cycles of syndrome extraction in a toric quantum error correcting code, using mid-circuit measurement and replacement of lost qubits, including reloading of a qubit reservoir for indefinite coherent operation. We characterize the logical error rate after up to 90 cycles, showing that logical information can be preserved through multiple rounds of qubit reloading. Comparing two distances of the code up to 8 rounds of syndrome extraction shows a lower absolute logical error rate for the larger distance code.

Read source

U.S. Army Research Laboratory scientists demonstrate quantum sensor capable of 3D radio-frequency field detection

For the first time, scientists at the U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command, known as DEVCOM, Army Research Laboratory demonstrated a quantum sensor that can measure the full 3D direction of radio-frequency electromagnetic fields. This breakthrough could provide the Army with tools to improve situational awareness, enhance secure communications and enable faster, more informed decision-making on the battlefield.

Read source

Quantum Machines achieves 99.5% median two-qubit gate fidelity on Rigetti’s Novera quantum processor with OPX1000 platform

Quantum Machines has achieved a 99.5% median two-qubit gate fidelity on Rigetti Computing’s Novera superconducting QPU using its OPX1000 hardware and QUAlibrate software. The demonstration was achieved during onsite calibration and operation at Rigetti, maintaining consistent low error rates across all qubits. The OPX1000 platform’s automated calibration, real-time optimization, and performance monitoring support scalable high-fidelity deployments at organizations including Fermilab, Montana State University, and Horizon Quantum.

Read source

D-Wave Quantum announces gate-model roadmap targeting 100 logical qubits with fault tolerance by 2032

Targeting 100 logical qubits capable of successfully performing over one million operations by 2032, the roadmap combines D-Wave’s expertise in high-coherence dual-rail qubits and quantum error correction, with its proven ability to engineer, scale and commercialize superconducting quantum systems. In contrast to many other gate-model hardware modalities that cannot detect qubit errors, D-Wave’s dual-rail qubits are designed to identify approximately 90% of errors as they occur to dramatically lower the number of physical qubits required to perform error correction.

Read source

Oxford Quantum Circuits secures $350 million Series C to expand quantum computing services

Oxford Quantum Circuits (OQC), a UK-based scaleup developing quantum computers with superconducting qubits, has secured a $350m (£260m) Series C funding round, the largest ever for a private quantum computing company in Europe. The round was led by Bullhound Capital, with substantial participation from investors across Europe, the US, and Asia. OQC has deployed quantum systems in data centres in London, Tokyo, and New York, and sold a system to Spain’s CESGA.

Read source

Quantinuum raises $1.68 billion in U.S. IPO. Pricing shares at $60 each

Honeywell’s Quantinuum has raised $1.68 billion in its U.S. initial public offering after pricing shares at $60 each, attracting strong investor interest in the rapidly growing quantum computing sector. The company sold 28 million shares in the offering and will begin trading on the Nasdaq under the ticker ‘QNT.’ Quantinuum, formed in 2021 from the merger of Honeywell’s quantum business and Cambridge Quantum, remains in the early stages of commercial growth but has seen accelerating bookings recently.

How did this IPO compare with IonQ? (I know, apples with apples but still interesting)

Read source

C12 launches Pick & Place nanoassembly for high-precision carbon nanotube quantum chip manufacturing

C12 has announced ‘Pick & Place,’ a patented nanoassembly process that transfers individual carbon nanotubes onto quantum chips with micrometric precision. This process decouples nanotube growth from chip fabrication and enables preselection and qualification of nanotubes before their integration, addressing qubit variability and improving quality control. With partial automation, C12 increased its throughput to 50 devices in four weeks, compared to a year with its previous method, illustrating a major advance in manufacturing efficiency.

Read source

OQC, JPMorganChase, and AMD launch research collaboration on dedicated Quantum-AI platform in London

JPMorganChase and AMD Commence Research Collaboration to Develop New Quantum-AI Platform in London. Research integrates OQC GENESIS with AI and high-performance classical computing with JPMorganChase’s industry-leading quantum and AI R&D. The Quantum-AI Data Centre, built by OQC in London. The partners will use the platform to conduct research on the application of near-term quantum and hybrid quantum-classical computing including areas such as portfolio optimization and expanding explorations around quantum machine learning, while also developing specialized AI models to improve quantum circuit performance.

Read source

SEALSQ Corporation acquires Miraex SA to complete its quantum sovereign technology stack and boost space-based quantum infrastructure

SEALSQ has acquired entire issued share capital of Miraex SA. The investment has been made using the Company’s Quantum Fund, SEALQUANTUM.com, an internal strategic investment initiative of SEALSQ using a dedicated allocation of our cash with the goal of accelerating the development of a fully integrated Quantum Vertical Sovereign Stack. The Quantum Fund has total approved capital resources of $ 200 million, of which over $65 million has already been deployed in several projects (including Miraex). Built around a proprietary Thin Film Lithium Tantalate (TFLT) Photonic Integrated Circuit (PIC) platform, Miraex's technology enables the conversion of quantum information between microwave frequencies (the operating domain of superconducting and semiconductor spin based quantum processors) and optical frequencies (the medium of choice for quantum communication), a foundational capability without which distributed quantum architectures cannot function at scale.

Read source

Amazon Braket makes Rigetti Cepheus-1-108Q 108-qubit superconducting quantum device generally available

Amazon Braket enables customers to design and run quantum algorithms on a broad selection of quantum hardware through a unified interface. On April 7, 2026, we expanded the hardware available on Braket with the general availability of Rigetti Computing’s Cepheus-1-108Q, a 108-qubit superconducting quantum processing unit (QPU). Cepheus-1-108Q is the first gate-based quantum device with more than 100 qubits available on Amazon Braket. It replaces the Ankaa-3 system and represents the third generation of Rigetti hardware on the service. The device is built using Rigetti’s proprietary multi-chip architecture that tiles twelve 9-qubit chiplets into a single processor. It is physically located in the United States and available through the US West (N. California) Region.

Read source

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Quantum Key Distribution

Latest strip published May 31, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) is the most mature application of quantum cryptography. It solves a specific problem: allowing two parties to generate a shared secret key with a guarantee, based on physics, that no eavesdropper has a copy. The best-known The post Quantum Key Distribution first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

Caltech team shows FeMo-co nitrogenase benchmark can be solved classically to chemical accuracy

For years, the iron-molybdenum cofactor in nitrogenase was treated as a flagship quantum-advantage chemistry target. Garnet Chan’s Caltech team used optimized classical tensor-network methods to simulate the standard 76-orbital FeMo-co model to chemical accuracy, arguing that the relevant electrons are only slightly entangled. The uncomfortable but useful lesson: classical algorithms keep moving the goalposts, and quantum chemistry advantage will have to be earned against increasingly clever classical competition.

Read source

Google Willow chip reaches King’s College London for photosynthesis and light-harvesting research

A King’s College London research team led by Dr. Eleanor Crane and Dr. Alexander Schuckert became the first academic group in the UK to gain direct access to Google’s Willow quantum chip. Their target is not a toy benchmark: they plan to model complex quantum systems behind photosynthesis and light harvesting, with longer-term ambitions around solar-cell design, zero-loss power grids, and molecular simulation for disease research.

Read source

D-Wave says its quantum-supremacy result still stands after Flatiron tensor-network challenge

D-Wave pushed back against claims that classical tensor-network simulations had overturned its quantum-supremacy result. CEO Alan Baratz argued that the Flatiron Institute’s BP-TNS method did not reproduce the full scope of D-Wave’s peer-reviewed topological simulations, especially in strongly coupled three-dimensional spin glasses and higher-dimensional biclique geometries. The classical counterattack is real, but D-Wave’s position is that the hardest regimes remain standing.

Read source

D-Wave receives second-year SQFab funding for scalable superconducting qubit fabrication

Alongside the supremacy debate, D-Wave secured second-year support for its SQFab program, focused on superconducting qubits with scalable fabrication. The funding, routed through Nordtech and tied to U.S. national-security semiconductor priorities, reinforces a wider theme of the week: quantum manufacturing is becoming a sovereignty and defense issue, not just a university-lab curiosity.

Read source

Monash University demonstrates room-temperature programmable valley optoelectronic nanocircuit

Researchers at Monash University built an on-chip programmable valley optoelectronic nanocircuit by combining atomically thin materials with engineered metasurfaces. The device manipulates the valley degree of freedom in 2D materials and operates at room temperature, processing and routing two distinct images simultaneously. The promise: low-power, high-bandwidth quantum-photonic-style routing without dragging every experiment into the cryogenic dungeon.

Read source

Stanford demonstrates room-temperature spin entanglement using twisted light and MoSe₂

A Stanford team led by Jennifer Dionne and Feng Pan reported a nanoscale room-temperature device that links light and electron spin behavior. The system combines molybdenum diselenide with a nanopatterned silicon substrate, using chiroptical light to transfer angular momentum into localized electrons. If the effect proves scalable, this is the kind of platform that could move quantum components closer to ordinary electronics and away from giant liquid-helium castles.

Read source

Brown and University of Michigan stabilize a strange intermediate crystal phase with quantum optical properties

Researchers from Brown University and the University of Michigan used tailored silver nanoparticles, stacked like nanoscale LEGO bricks, to stabilize an intermediate structural phase normally seen only during transitions in metals. The resulting phase shows unusual quantum optical and chiroptical behavior at room temperature, hinting at a bottom-up manufacturing route for custom quantum materials.

Read source

University of Illinois team pushes 3D silicon stacking to extend chip scaling

At UIUC’s Grainger College of Engineering, Qing Cao’s team demonstrated a method for stacking multiple silicon electronics layers vertically using ultra-thin silicon membranes and low-temperature processing. This is not a qubit headline, but it matters: future quantum systems will need dense classical control, readout, and coprocessing infrastructure. The quantum computer still needs a very serious classical machine wrapped around it.

Read source

Room-temperature and integration breakthroughs: hardware snapshot

A compact view of the week’s hardware, materials, and structural stories added to the issue.

University of Strathclyde researchers propose randomized alternative to adiabatic quantum computation

Joseph Cunningham and Jérémie Roland proposed replacing resource-heavy time-dependent Hamiltonian evolutions with randomized, probabilistic applications of unitaries. The mathematical payoff is improved Trotter error behavior and a route toward better scaling for the Quantum Linear Systems Problem. Not flashy, not meme-friendly, but exactly the sort of algorithmic plumbing that can reduce physical overhead.

Read source

Quantum machine-learning researchers derive scaling bounds for Pauli-string models

New work on quantum machine-learning generalization uses Rademacher complexity to bound how Pauli-string quantum models can overfit random noise. By relating model size and training-sample count, the results provide a more rigorous way to compare quantum model capacity with classical linear models. In plain pirate: fewer vibes, more math. Good.

Read source

Mathematical and software frontier: quick map

Two algorithmic stories:

Security researchers warn MCP deployments are exposed to harvest-now-decrypt-later quantum risk

The Model Context Protocol is becoming the gateway between AI agents and sensitive enterprise systems. Security researchers warn that encrypted MCP traffic is a prime harvest-now-decrypt-later target: future quantum decryption could expose tool calls, prompts, credentials, and decision history. Their proposed defense is quantum-secure-by-construction infrastructure: hybrid cryptographic proxies, short-lived signed tokens, and authorization that does not blindly trust the transport layer.

Read source

Infleqtion expands UK quantum operations with Oxford innovation and manufacturing hub

Infleqtion UK opened a dedicated Quantum Innovation Centre at Oxford Technology Park, tripling its UK research, production, and systems-integration footprint. The company says the facility will support atom-based RF sensing, optical hardware, and deployable systems, building on work such as the UK’s first 100-physical-qubit machine for the National Quantum Computing Centre and optical-clock deployments. Sovereign quantum manufacturing is becoming a product category.

Read source

Infleqtion financial snapshot highlights the brutal cash demands of quantum hardware

A late-May financial snapshot of Infleqtion points to the less glamorous side of quantum ambition: high burn, volatile equity, and a cash runway that may require fresh capital. That does not invalidate the technology, but it reminds investors that quantum hardware companies are capital furnaces. The fridge may be cold, but the cash burn is not.

Read source

Pure-play quantum market snapshot

[PAPER] Max Planck Institute team traps single rubidium atoms 150 nm from silicon-nitride photonic resonators, hitting 32% loading efficiency and cooperativity above one—serious progress for scalable quantum photonic circuits, but lifetimes and integration still fragile.

Strong atom-photon interactions on scalable photonic platforms hold significant potential for both atomic and photonic quantum information platforms. In particular, trapping of a single atom on a planar photonic integrated resonator at the subwavelength distances required for strong coupling to the guided modes has remained an outstanding challenge. Here we demonstrate efficient trapping of a single ultracold rubidium atom within the evanescent field of an integrated silicon-nitride microring resonator, at distances of 150-200 nm from the chip surface. Efficient, single-stroke loading process is achieved using an evanescent-field mechanism related to Sisyphus cooling, in which a single scattering event dissipates the atom's kinetic energy and transfers it into a near-surface trap. We observe logarithmic scaling of trapping durations spanning from sub-millisecond timescales up to 1 second, without continuous cooling. The trapped atom couples efficiently to the resonator, enabling on-chip photon collection, photon antibunching, and Purcell-enhanced spontaneous emission with single-atom cooperativity exceeding unity. Our results establish the potential of CMOS-compatible chip-based atom-photon interfaces for scalable quantum photonic circuits.

Read source

[PAPER] Tsinghua University and University of California Berkeley launch MNISQ

We introduce MNISQ, the first large-scale dataset for both quantum and classical machine learning during the NISQ era, containing 4.95 million circuits of 10 qubits constructed with up to 100 two-qubit gates. MNISQ serves as a foundational resource for developing natural language processing (NLP) models for quantum computing and deep learning models. The dataset is derived from quantum-encoded classical data (e.g., MNIST) and is available in two formats: quantum circuits and classical descriptions (Quantum Assembly Language, QASM).

Read source

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory researchers develop holistic quantum computing stack to enable next-generation systems

Researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory are advancing quantum computing by focusing on the entire technology stack, including superconducting quantum processors, dilution refrigeration, control electronics, and integrated software. AQT utilizes systems like QubiC for controlling qubits and is developing AI-assisted solutions (QubiCML) for error correction. Berkeley Lab’s interdisciplinary teams leverage facilities such as the Molecular Foundry and NERSC to address material and computation challenges, aiming to scale from current first-generation, few-qubit devices to robust, error-corrected systems with thousands of qubits for impactful scientific applications.

Read source

Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Commonwealth of Massachusetts announce $25 million Quantum Systems Laboratory to establish regional quantum hub

• MIT and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts announced plans to establish the Quantum Systems Laboratory (QSL) at MIT, which will be open to researchers across the region.

• With the new funding from the state, which will match federal funding for quantum research already underway at MIT, the Institute aims to begin construction on the QSL facility this summer.

• The QSL will host specialized facilities that will enable Massachusetts scientists to undertake impactful work applying quantum research across practical domains, including life sciences and national defense.

Read source

University of Oxford researchers successfully load a complete hepatitis D virus genome onto a quantum computer

Researchers at the University of Oxford, collaborating with Cambridge, Melbourne, the Wellcome Sanger Institute, and Kyiv Academic University, have achieved a world first by loading the complete genome of the hepatitis D virus onto a quantum computer. This milestone was part of Wellcome Leap’s Quantum for Bio (Q4Bio) programme, aimed at exploring the application of quantum computing to biological problems. The team succeeded in encoding the viral genome using 117 qubits on IBM’s 156-qubit Heron processor, requiring the development of novel methods to represent and compress genomic data for quantum processing. The work demonstrates a significant step toward applying quantum algorithms in genomics and public health.

Read source

Duke Quantum Center develops multi-computer trapped-ion quantum network and plans 256-qubit system

The Duke Quantum Center, directed by Kenneth Brown, stands out as the world’s only ‘vertical’ quantum computing center, capable of building quantum computers from programming through assembly. DQC’s team has grown from five to fifteen faculty members since its founding in 2021 and is collaborating with regional institutions like UNC Chapel Hill and NC State University. Their current projects include an unprecedented three-machine trapped-ion network with a 97% fidelity in entanglement experiments and the QSIM quantum analog simulator for tackling complex Hamiltonian systems. DQC aims to develop a 256-qubit quantum computer within seven years, supported by a $1 million grant, which could significantly advance the field’s computational power.

Read source

Qubic secures first contract to supply cryogenic amplifiers to Quantum Machines

Qubic, a Canadian developer of quantum computing hardware, has secured a contract with Quantum Machines, a global leader in hybrid control systems for quantum computing, to supply its low-noise cryogenic KI-TWPA amplifiers. This marks Quantum Machines as Qubic’s first customer for these amplifiers, which promise significantly reduced heat dissipation (under 0.1 milliwatts at 4 Kelvin) and enhanced reliability crucial for scalable quantum computers. Quantum Machines will benchmark Qubic’s amplifiers against existing solutions, while Qubic is also partnering with the Israeli Quantum Computing Center (IQCC) to test the devices in practical quantum computing environments.

Read source

Terra Quantum and Axiom Intelligence Acquisition Corp 1 sign $3.5 billion business combination agreement to take Terra Quantum public

Terra Quantum AG and Axiom Intelligence Acquisition Corp 1 have signed a definitive Business Combination Agreement valuing Terra Quantum at approximately $3.5 billion, resulting in the company going public on Nasdaq under the ticker “TQ.” The transaction, unanimously approved by both companies’ boards, is expected to close in the second half of 2026. The deal supports further R&D investment, global expansion, and provides up to $190 million in gross proceeds assuming no redemptions by Axiom’s public stockholders. Terra Quantum, headquartered in St.

Read source

Apple publishes quantum-resistant cryptographic code and verification tools for public review

Apple has released its quantum-resistant cryptographic code and mathematical verification tools to the public, aiming to promote independent review and wider industry adoption. The package includes implementations of the ML-KEM and ML-DSA quantum-secure algorithms, as well as the formal verification libraries and tools integrated into Apple’s corecrypto library, which underpins encryption for over 2.5 billion devices. Deployments began with iMessage in 2024 and expanded to VPN and TLS networking.

Read source

IBM to invest over $10 billion to build large-scale quantum computer by 2029

IBM announced a plan to invest over $10 billion in quantum computing over five years, with the goal of building the first large-scale, fault-tolerant quantum computer by 2029. The initiative coincides with a Trump administration move to invest $2 billion in equity stakes across nine quantum computing firms, half of which will fund Anderon, a new venture with IBM as a principal contributor and the first dedicated quantum chip manufacturing facility in the U.S. IBM currently claims deployment of more than 90 quantum systems, serving hundreds of companies, startups, universities, and government agencies.

Read source

Cisco introduces full-stack post-quantum cryptography to secure campus and branch networks from boot to data transport

Cisco has introduced full-stack post-quantum cryptography (PQC) to protect campus and branch networks from hardware boot processes through to data transport. The approach integrates NIST-approved quantum-resistant algorithms, starting at the hardware boot level with Cisco Secure Boot on C9000 Smart Switches, and extends protection to transport protocols such as SSH, MACsec, IPsec, and TLS using lattice-based ML-KEM. By embedding PQC at every network stack layer, including hardware-anchored trust modules and quantum-resistant key exchanges, Cisco aims to secure device and data integrity against current and future quantum-enabled threats, supporting compliance with evolving standards like CNSA 2.0.

Read source

PQC Migration: Start with TLS and ignore almost everything else for now

An article by Michael Osborne where he recommends reducing the scope and focusing on TLS.

Read source

Barcelona Supercomputing Center inaugurates third quantum computer, EuroQCS-Spain, in renovated Torre Girona chapel

The new computer, co-funded by the European Commission and the Government of Spain with an investment of €9.8 million, adds new capabilities to the European supercomputing and quantum computing landscape by presenting an analog coding technology, complementary to the quantum system previously installed at BSC

Read source

This week in quantum, the real signal lives in scrappy progress under the hood—less flash, more function. Kicking off on the science front, Atos alongside researchers from Technical University Vienna, Charles University Prague, and Bull rolled out an algorithm built to toughen up agentic AI making high-stakes calls with cloudy data, while Aydin Abadi’s team introduced a clever ‘time-delayed public verification’ protocol that uses a post-quantum time-lock puzzle to audit outsourced quantum cloud computations safely without leaking keys. Turning to algorithmic muscle, ParityQC and IBM set a new mark with a 52-qubit quantum Fourier transform executed on an IBM Quantum Heron chip using the ‘Parity Twine’ method to minimize SWAP-gate noise—though we shouldn’t declare the scaling challenge solved just yet. Meanwhile, Pauline Mathiot’s team demonstrated that noise-mitigation and logical qubit encoding on a neutral-atom processor can make functional differences in solving differential equations even now, and the University of Chicago introduced velocity-enabled neutral-atom computing, utilizing controlled Doppler shifts and atom speeds to dramatically slash hardware overhead and shuttling delays during quantum error correction.

On the hardware fabrication side, the industry is pushing hard toward scalable, repeatable manufacturing. University of Tsukuba researchers fabricated the first superconducting diamond Josephson junction to pave a path toward hybrid quantum chips; Imec achieved a world first by printing a network of silicon quantum dot qubits with tiny 6nm gaps using High NA EUV lithography; and QuantWare’s CEO Matt Rijlaarsdam doubled down on reducing cost-per-qubit via open, manufacturable hardware architectures. The enterprise and data center footprints are also maturing quickly. GSMA and QCentroid rolled out a hybrid framework putting telecom network problems to the test, and Saudi Arabia marked a massive regional milestone with Aramco and Pasqal activating the Kingdom’s first cloud-accessible quantum computer in Dhahran. Quantinuum and Synopsys announced a heavy-hitting partnership to embed quantum algorithms into industrial simulation guts for aerospace and manufacturing. Photonic computing got its milestone too, as Q.ANT signed up IONOS as the debut commercial customer for its Thin-Film Lithium Niobate Native Processing Server. For data center deployment, Equal1 and Dell unveiled ‘RacQ’—the world’s first enterprise-ready, rack-mounted quantum computer that plugs right into a standard 19-inch server rack using standard wall-socket power—while QuiX Quantum launched its PACU rack-mount controller to monitor up to 1,000 photonic phase shifters without taking systems offline. Similarly, Elevate Quantum and its partners delivered Q-PAC, the United States’ first fully deployable, modular open-architecture quantum system, popping an initial 17-qubit machine into operation in just five months.

Capital and government intervention are moving just as fast to solidify supply chains and secure geographic dominance. In Europe, Algorithmiq raised €18 million and relocated its global headquarters to Milan to focus on the industrial algorithm layer, signaling a shift away from North American dominance. This comes alongside French President Emmanuel Macron announcing a massive €1.5 billion investment—splitting €1 billion toward domestic quantum firms like Alice & Bob (who also just expanded their Series B to €100 million with backing from NVIDIA’s NVentures) and €550 million for local microelectronics. Not to be outpaced, the U.S. government drops a massive $2 billion anchor funded via the CHIPS Act, securing minority equity stakes across nine quantum firms—including $1 billion to partner with IBM on ‘Anderon,’ America’s first dedicated 300-millimeter quantum foundry in Albany, NY, alongside allocations for GlobalFoundries ($375M), D-Wave, Rigetti, Infleqtion ($100M each), Diraq ($38M), Atom Computing, PsiQuantum, and Quantinuum. On the defense and security beat, SBQuantum locked down $3 million in Canadian defence contracts for its quantum diamond magnetometer arrays, while Quantum Bridge pulled in $8 million to push its post-quantum Symmetric-Key Distribution System into existing networks. Simultaneously, NIST advanced nine digital signature algorithms—including FAEST, HAWK, and MAYO—to its third round of post-quantum cryptography standardization. To feed this explosive growth, institutions across North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific are dramatically expanding graduate quantum offerings to fill an estimated 250,000 sector jobs by 2030. Taken together, the signal is undeniable: quantum computing is shifting rapidly away from speculative noise and toward heavily funded, modular, and resilient vertical integrations ready for real-world friction.

Buf. That was a mouthful but only this last week countries have poured more money than in the last few months combined!

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Y2Q

Latest strip published May 24, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

Y2Q, “Years to Quantum,” refers to the estimated time remaining before a quantum computer capable of breaking widely deployed public-key cryptography becomes operational. It is a planning horizon, not a fixed date, and it drives urgency across government, finance, and The post Y2Q first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

Aydin Abadi and collaborators propose time-delayed public verification method for trustworthy quantum cloud computation

To ensure the trustworthiness of outsourced quantum cloud computations without compromising security, researchers have developed a novel protocol based on "time-delayed public verifiability." Traditional methods rely on secret verification keys that cannot be shared publicly without risking server fraud, but this new approach encapsulates the private key inside a post-quantum "time-lock puzzle." The quantum server receives the necessary information to complete the computation and generate a proof, but it is cryptographically delayed from accessing the key. Once the computation is completed and published, the puzzle naturally unlocks, making the verification key public so that any third-party auditor, customer, or regulator can safely inspect the proof and verify the results.

Read source

Atos and collaborators introduce quantum algorithm to enhance agentic AI decision-making under uncertainty

Atos highlights a new quantum algorithm that augments agentic AI systems—autonomous or semi-autonomous entities operating under uncertainty—by improving their decision-making efficiency. Accepted to AAMAS 2026, this work demonstrates that quantum enhancements in search, optimization, and sampling can robustly expand agentic AI capabilities, with implications for auctions, negotiations, and real-world risk analysis. In collaboration with researchers from Technical University Vienna, Charles University Prague, and Bull, Atos co-authored a paper introducing quantum algorithms for imperfect information games such as Skat.

Read source

ParityQC researchers demonstrate record 52-qubit quantum Fourier transform on IBM quantum processor

Researchers from ParityQC achieved a record-setting 52-qubit quantum Fourier transform (QFT) using an IBM Quantum Heron processor, marking the largest such circuit demonstrated to date. The team addressed scaling challenges by introducing the Parity Twine method, which eliminates explicit SWAP gates by tracking parity information instead of individual qubit states. This reduced circuit depth and error rates, nearly doubling the previous QFT benchmark on trapped-ion hardware.

Read source

Pauline Mathiot and collaborators benchmark machine-learning differential equation solver on neutral-atom logical processor

The paper presents a performance comparison between physical and logical computations for solving differential equations using quantum kernel methods on a neutral-atom logical quantum processor. The logical implementation of the machine-learning algorithm outperformed its physical-level counterpart on key metrics, with improvements attributed to the detection and mitigation of noise-induced errors through specific encoding strategies. The study confirms that the benefits of logical quantum processing are retained in end-to-end applications, highlighting the positive impact of fault-tolerance even with higher resource demands.

Read source

University of Tsukuba fabricates first superconducting diamond Josephson junction, opening path to hybrid quantum chips

Researchers from the Pennsylvania State University, the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering (PME), and the U.S. Department of Energy National Quantum Information Science Research Center Q-NEXT, led by Argonne National Laboratory, have uncovered new insights into the physics behind the phenomenon by carefully creating high-quality diamond, isolating electronic signatures from material noise, and revealing the fundamental mechanisms that had long remained hidden. The study, recently published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, offers a potential roadmap for enabling multiple functions on one quantum chip—an innovation that could make quantum technologies more efficient and better able to integrate with classical technologies.

Read source

An illustrated field guide to qubits

A collection of great illustrations explaining quantum computing effects and qubits.

Read source

University of Chicago demonstrates velocity-enabled quantum computing with neutral atoms, claims control of atom speeds for faster gate operations

Realizing error-corrected logical qubits is a central goal for the current development of digital quantum computers. Neutral atoms offer the opportunity to coherently shuttle atoms for realizing efficient quantum error correction based on long-range connectivity and parallel atom transport. Nevertheless, time overheads in shuttling atoms and complex control hardware pose challenges to scaling current architectures. Here, we introduce atom velocity as a new degree of freedom in neutral-atom architectures tailored to quantum error correction. Through controlled Doppler shifts, we demonstrate velocity-selective mid-circuit state preparation and measurement on moving atoms, leaving spectator atoms unaffected. Furthermore, we achieve on-the-fly local single-qubit rotations by mapping micron-scale atom displacements to the spatial phase of global control beams. Complementing these techniques with CZ entangling gates with a fidelity of 99.86(4)%, we experimentally implement key primitives for quantum error correction and measurement-based quantum computing. We generate an eight-qubit entangled cluster state with an average stabilizer value of 0.830(4), realize an [[4,2,2]] error-detection code with 99.0(3) % logical Bell-state fidelity, and perform stabilizer measurements using a flying ancilla. By enabling selective operations on continuously moving atoms using only global beams, this velocity-enabled architecture reduces hardware overhead while minimizing shuttling and transfer delays, opening a new pathway for fast, large-scale atom-based quantum computation.

Read source

GSMA and QCentroid advance programme to build quantum readiness in telecom through use case experimentation

The GSMA and QCentroid have launched a collaborative programme to help telecom operators transition from interest in quantum computing to practical readiness. Announced at MWC Barcelona 2026, the initiative tackles the industry’s shift from theoretical discussions to experimentation, focusing on four real-world use cases: small cell placement, network anomaly detection, predictive maintenance, and sleep mode scheduling for energy efficiency. The project offers frameworks for defining, modeling, and economically assessing telecom network challenges using hybrid quantum-classical approaches.

Read source

Aramco and Pasqal launch Saudi Arabia’s first quantum computer in Dhahran

Saudi Arabia has marked a milestone in advanced computing after Aramco and Pasqal activated the Kingdom’s first quantum computer in Dhahran, underscoring the country’s push to strengthen its position in emerging technologies and digital innovation. According to a press release, the ceremony at Aramco’s data center also saw the unveiling of the region’s first commercial Quantum Computing-as-a-Service platform, making the machine available to enterprises and research institutions worldwide via a secure cloud interface.

Read source

Quantinuum and Synopsys establish partnership to integrate quantum computing into industrial design workflows

Quantinuum announced a strategic collaboration with Synopsys to integrate quantum computing into industrial engineering workflows, targeting critical simulation and design challenges in sectors such as aerospace, life sciences, semiconductors, and advanced manufacturing. The partnership aims to build scalable workflows embedding quantum algorithms into existing software to achieve higher simulation accuracy, faster development cycles, and more cost-effective R&D. Quantinuum’s President and CEO, dr. Rajeeb Hazra, emphasized the goal of making quantum computing a practical business advantage, while Synopsys’ Prith Banerjee highlighted the intent to help innovators tackle demanding physical design problems. The collaboration builds on Quantinuum’s industry-leading quantum hardware and Synopsys’ expertise in engineering simulation.

Read source

Q.ANT announces IONOS as first commercial customer for photonic AI processor

Q.ANT has signed IONOS, a major European cloud provider, as the first commercial customer for its Native Processing Server (NPS), advancing the commercialization of photonic AI computing. Leveraging its proprietary Thin-Film Lithium Niobate (TFLN) technology, Q.ANT’s second-generation Native Processing Unit (NPU) demonstrated up to 100x performance improvements over its predecessor at the Leibniz Supercomputing Centre, and internal benchmarks indicate 30x higher energy efficiency and 50x greater performance per application compared to conventional processors. Following prior research deployments, the commercial rollout with IONOS, announced at re:publica 2026, marks a major milestone for Q.ANT.

Read source

Algorithmiq raises €18 million and relocates global headquarters to Milan to advance industrial quantum algorithms

Milan, Italy is now the global headquarters for Algorithmiq, following a €18 million strategic funding round, the largest venture capital investment to date into an Italian quantum startup. The funding, led by Jacopo Drudi of United Ventures with participation from Inventure VC, will allow Algorithmiq to focus on building and industrializing the algorithmic layer that makes quantum computers useful today. According to the company, future breakthroughs will stem from software, specifically the algorithms and workflows that transform quantum systems into practical tools. Algorithmiq stated that access to Europe’s strongest quantum talent, industrial networks, and strategic capital will help accelerate the transition into real-world impact for its global partners and customers, signaling a shift in quantum development away from North American dominance.

Read source

Alice & Bob lands investment from NVIDIA’s NVentures, extends Series B to €100M—quantum hardware gets a big-name backer, real money, still early innings

Alice & Bob, a leader in fault tolerant quantum computing, has announced an investment from NVentures, NVIDIA’s venture capital arm, that expands its €100 million Series B round. The investment supports Alice & Bob’s development of an architecture towards fault-tolerant quantum computing. Financial details of the investment were not disclosed.

Read source

Emmanuel Macron announces €1.5 billion investment in quantum computing and microelectronics

French President Emmanuel Macron announced an additional €1.5 billion investment in advanced technologies, split into €1 billion to bolster France’s quantum computing strategy and €550 million for the microelectronics sector.

Key Details of the Initiative

• Quantum Computing (€1 Billion): This fresh round of funding adds to France’s existing National Quantum Plan (which originally began in 2021). It aims to support domestic firms—such as quantum computing company Alice & Bob—to ensure France and the broader European Union maintain digital sovereignty alongside accelerating U.S. and Chinese tech advancements.

• Microelectronics (€550 Million): This capital will back a European semiconductor program, building on previous French strategies to strengthen local supply chains and develop advanced microchips.

• The Location: Macron revealed the funding during a visit to the Very Large Computing Center (TGCC) at the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission (CEA) in Bruyères-le-Châtel.

Read source

Elevate Quantum and partners launch first commercially deployable quantum open architecture system in United States

Elevate Quantum, joined by partners Q-CTRL, QuantWare, Qblox, Maybell Quantum, and Arrow Electronics, has launched the Quantum Platform for the Advancement of Commercialization (Q-PAC) at Colorado’s Quantum Commons, marking the United States’ first commercially deployable Quantum Open Architecture (QOA) system. Q-PAC offers integrated quantum computing—spanning processors, control electronics, cryogenics, and infrastructure software—with an initial 17-qubit processor and a clear upgrade path, providing enterprise-ready, transparent, and reproducible quantum solutions. The system transitioned from concept to operation in just five months, underscoring rapid deployment capabilities using the open Quantum Utility Block (QUB) architecture.

Read source

QuiX Quantum launches PACU control unit to enable scalable photonic quantum systems

QuiX Quantum has launched the Photonic Assembly Control Unit (PACU), a rack-mountable device standardizing the control layer for the company’s photonic quantum systems, with a focus on scalability and modularity. Supporting up to 1,000 low-speed and 32 high-speed phase shifters, PACU is designed for data center and HPC environments and enables reliable control, easier maintenance, and integration. The device allows for hot-swappable operation, air cooling, monitoring, and resilient board-to-board connections, addressing key requirements for deploying universal photonic quantum computers.

Read source

Quantum Bridge raises $8 million in Series A funding for quantum-safe key distribution solution

Quantum Bridge, a Toronto-based company, announced it has secured $8 million in Series A funding for its quantum-safe key distribution solution, raising its total funding to $16 million. Investors in this round included Wayra (Telefónica), Cadenza VC, HPE, and others. Its Symmetric-Key Distribution System (SDS) integrates DSKE, post-quantum cryptography, and quantum key distribution, deployable into existing network infrastructure with minimal changes.

Read source

Equal1 and Dell unveil prototype rack-mounted quantum computer for standard data centers

Equal1 and Dell have introduced RacQ, the world’s first rack-mounted, enterprise-targeted quantum computer, announced at Dell Technologies World 2026. RacQ fits inside a standard 19-inch data center rack and operates from a regular single-phase 1.6kW wall socket, comparable to classical high-performance servers. Dell acts as infrastructure and systems integration partner, emphasizing seamless quantum deployment within existing enterprise ecosystems.

Read source

IBM and U.S. Department of Commerce agree to build America’s first dedicated quantum foundry supported by $1 billion CHIPS award

IBM and the U.S. Department of Commerce have announced a Letter of Intent to establish Anderon, America’s first dedicated quantum chip foundry, supported by a proposed $1 billion CHIPS Act incentive and matched by IBM’s $1 billion investment. Anderon, to be headquartered in Albany, New York, will operate as a standalone company focusing on 300-millimeter quantum wafer production for multiple vendors and aims to solidify the U.S.

Read source

National Institute of Standards and Technology advances nine digital signature algorithms to third round of post-quantum cryptography standardization

This report describes the evaluation criteria and selection process of the Second Round of the Additional Digital Signatures for the NIST Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQC) Standardization Process, which will identify public-key digital signature algorithms for potential standardization to protect sensitive information into the foreseeable future, including after the advent of quantum computers. Any signature scheme that is eventually selected will augment FIPS 204, Module-Lattice-Based Digital Signature Standard; FIPS 205, Stateless Hash-Based Digital Signature Standard; FIPS 186-5, Digital Signature Standard (DSS); and SP 800-208, Recommendation for Stateful Hash-Based Signature Schemes. Based on public feedback and internal reviews of the second-round candidates, NIST has selected nine candidate algorithms to move forward to the third round of evaluation: FAEST, HAWK, MAYO, MQOM, QR-UOV, SDitH, SNOVA, SQIsign, and UOV.

Read source

SBQuantum secures two contracts worth $3 million with Canada’s Department of National Defence for quantum magnetometer arrays

SBQuantum has announced two contracts with Canada’s Department of National Defence, totaling $3 million CAD. The first contract, worth $1.05 million and funded through the DND’s Innovation for Defence Excellence and Security (IDEaS) program, supports real-world operational testing of SBQuantum’s quantum diamond magnetometers. The second, valued at $1.95 million, comes from Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada’s Innovative Solutions Canada (ISC) program and will integrate SBQuantum’s technology into unmanned aerial vehicles for airborne detection and navigation.

Read source

Imec presents first quantum dot qubit device fabricated with High NA EUV lithography

Imec has achieved a world first by presenting a quantum dot qubit device fabricated using High NA EUV lithography, unveiled at ITF World. This milestone signifies substantial progress toward industrial scaling of reliable qubits, with imec fabricating a functioning network of silicon quantum dot qubits with gaps as small as 6 nanometers. The integration of High NA EUV lithography allows these qubits to be produced with fab-compatible, reproducible processes, moving quantum technology beyond individual lab devices.

Read source

QuantWare CEO Matt Rijlaarsdam emphasizes cost-per-qubit reduction through scalable, open architecture quantum hardware

AZoQuantum speaks with Matt Rijlaarsdam, CEO of QuantWare, about the company’s approach to scaling superconducting quantum processors and addressing the hardware bottlenecks facing the industry. In this interview, Matt shares QuantWare’s vision for practical quantum computing, the importance of manufacturable qubit architectures, and how the company is positioning itself within the rapidly evolving quantum ecosystem.

Read source

United States invests $2 billion in IBM and other quantum computing firms, taking equity stakes

The U.S. government is investing $2 billion across nine quantum computing firms, securing minority equity stakes in each. Funded via the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act, the initiative aims to accelerate domestic technology manufacturing, secure supply chains, and maintain a strategic advantage over China.

Major Award Allocations

The Department of Commerce signed letters of intent for the following funding and equity distributions:

• IBM: \(\$1\) billion to establish “Anderon,” the first dedicated quantum chip manufacturing facility in New Albany, New York.

• GlobalFoundries: \(\$375\) million to build a U.S.-based factory capable of producing components for quantum machines.

• D-Wave Quantum, Rigetti Computing, and Infleqtion: \(\$100\) million each.

• Diraq: Up to \(\$38\) million to address specific technical challenges.

• Other Participants: Atom Computing, PsiQuantum, and Quantinuum are also slated to receive funding from the package.

Read source

Institutions across North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific expand graduate offerings in quantum computing for 2026

Quantum computing research has moved from a narrow academic specialty into one of the more actively funded areas in science and engineering. Governments, national laboratories, and private companies are all hiring – TQI’s analysis projects 250,000 new quantum sector jobs by 2030, and the talent pipeline has not kept pace with demand. For people considering graduate education in the field, the range of available programs has expanded considerably and the variation in depth and career outcomes across those programs is significant. This article covers around 20 programs across North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific, with notes on research focus, notable faculty, and what distinguishes each. The goal is to give prospective students a grounded starting point instead of a ranked list.

Read source

More links

• Multiverse Computing integrates quantum hardware into Meta’s Llama 3.1 language model, improving benchmark performance

• Research Square reveals expert and crowd disagreement signals higher venture quality in life-science equity crowdfunding—statistical analysis on 300+ campaigns bucks the crowd-predicts-success myth

• Quantum Machines acquires QHarbor to establish new Delft office

• Photonic Inc. closes over $200 million USD investment round led by Planet First Partners, raising post-money valuation to $2 billion USD

• eleQtron clinches $66 million funding round to scale trapped-ion processors, eyes commercial deployment

• IonQ claims 35 algorithmic qubits on trapped-ion hardware; coherence holds, but scaling questions remain

• University of Science and Technology of China claims optical quantum supremacy with Jiuzhang 4.0, boasting 255 detected photons

• IonQ, Rigetti Computing, and D-Wave Quantum report mixed Q1 2026 earnings with IonQ leading in revenue growth

• Xanadu CEO Christian Weedbrook defends long-term quantum computing vision after stock volatility

• Equal1 launches silicon-spin quantum computer in standard 19-inch server rack, demo shows 3-qubit prototype running at room temperature

• Google researchers claim AI-designed quantum circuits outperform human benchmarks on six tasks, cutting gate counts by up to 30%

• U.S. Department of Energy issues request for information on 2028 fault-tolerant quantum computer deployment

I am constinously trying to improve this newsletter. It has a combination of personal curation of news + AI support + Sergio’s snarky pirate comments. But I would like to understand whether you prefer longer format stories or something more concise for your easy consumption. You can also write directly with your feedback and thoughts. Thank you!

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Quantum Phase Estimation

Latest strip published May 17, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

Quantum Phase Estimation (QPE) is an algorithm that extracts a hidden angle, called a phase, from a quantum operation. When certain quantum operations act on specific quantum states, they rotate those states by a characteristic angle. QPE determines what that The post Quantum Phase Estimation first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

[PAPER] Multiverse researchers boost Llama 3.1 language model accuracy by 1.4% using 6,000-parameter quantum circuit adapters, running full inference on 156-qubit superconducting hardware—credible quantum AI gain, but hard limit hits at 2 qubits.

Quantum circuit adapters, parameterized via the Cayley transform and inserted into the frozen layers of Llama 3.1 8B, measurably improve language model perplexity by 1.4% using just 6,000 extra parameters, with end-to-end inference validated on a 156-qubit IBM superconducting processor. The improvement is explicitly demonstrated on real quantum hardware, with noise simulation confirming robustness at the 2-qubit scale; a systematic study on SmolLM2 shows monotonic perplexity gains with block size, 83% recovery of compression loss, and a sharp noise–expressivity phase transition at 3 qubits. This is the first credible, hardware-validated signal that quantum circuits can enhance production-scale large language models—albeit with classically simulable circuits and no computational speedup—marking a sober milestone for quantum AI, but the real game remains gated by hardware limits above 2 qubits.

Read source

Quobly and Hon Hai Research Institute release open-source Quantum Phase Estimation toolbox for fault-tolerant quantum computing research

Quobly, a French quantum microelectronics company, and the Hon Hai Research Institute (Foxconn’s R&D arm) have jointly released an open-source numerical toolbox dedicated to the Quantum Phase Estimation (QPE) algorithm. The QPE Toolbox is designed to help researchers explore and understand practical resource requirements and algorithmic trade-offs for fault-tolerant quantum computing, with a strong focus on quantum chemistry and materials science applications. Built on tensor network techniques, it supports circuit depth and gate analysis, initial state preparation, and compatibility with mainstream tools like PySCF and quimb.

Read source

Google launches REPLIQA program to fund university research on applying quantum computing and AI to life sciences

Google has announced the REPLIQA initiative, a $10 million research program focused on applying quantum science and AI to the life sciences. Through partnerships with five leading universities—Harvard, MIT, UC San Diego, UC Santa Barbara, and the University of Arizona—REPLIQA aims to develop quantum sensors and algorithms to simulate complex molecular interactions, such as protein folding and enzyme behavior. This foundational work is intended to provide the tools necessary for future advances in drug development and human health, representing a long-term investment in scientific discovery at the intersection of quantum computing and biology.

Read source

Banco Santander launches global challenge to find quantum computing and AI solutions from startups

Banco Santander has launched the ‘Santander X Global Challenge | The Quantum AI Leap’, a worldwide competition seeking innovative startups and scaleups from 10 countries that develop solutions in quantum computing and artificial intelligence. Developed in collaboration with IBM, Bluzec, and Oxentia Foundation, the initiative offers €120,000 in prizes, strategic mentoring from IBM experts, membership in the Santander X 100 community, and up to €10,000 in services from Bluzec. Startups and scaleups can submit projects in enabling quantum technologies, combined quantum-AI solutions, and digital security until 30 June.

Read source

NVision raises $55 million to expand quantum MRI platform and develop quantum computing technology for drug development

NVision, an Israeli-founded healthcare startup based in Ulm, Germany, has raised $55 million in a Series B round led by Abbott and including a $17 million venture loan from the European Investment Bank. The funding increases NVision’s total raised capital to $120 million. Initially focused on enhancing MRI signals for cancer imaging using quantum-based technologies, NVision is now expanding into quantum computing.

Read source

U.S. National Science Foundation launches $1.5 billion NSF X-Labs initiative to fund independent research teams tackling generational scientific challenges

The U.S. National Science Foundation has launched the $1.5 billion NSF X-Labs initiative, designed to advance breakthrough science through independent, milestone-driven research organizations over the next decade. Initial funding calls focus on scientific instrumentation leveraging quantum sensing and AI-driven imaging, as well as quantum systems interconnects and integrated photonics.

Read source

SEALSQ Corp files patent for post-quantum cryptography hardware security technique

SEALSQ Corp (NASDAQ:LAES) filed a new patent application on April 28, focusing on innovative protection techniques against side-channel attacks in cryptographic algorithms, specifically within polynomial-based post-quantum cryptography (PQC). This move reinforces SEALSQ’s intellectual property position ahead of a planned migration to PQC across Google’s ecosystem, impacting systems like Android 17 secure boot, Chromecast, and Widevine. The patent aims to harden hardware security and mitigate vulnerabilities from power consumption and electromagnetic emissions.

Read source

Meanwhile, silicon spin qubit outfit Diraq has moved fault-tolerant performance out of the demo phase and into the fab. Using imec’s 300-mm industrial line, Diraq produced high-fidelity spin qubits with over 99% accuracy on standard CMOS equipment—no bespoke voodoo required. The claim is stark: scale is only credible with full CMOS compatibility, and Diraq wants to be the first across that bridge from science fiction to scalable engineering.

Funding was interesting and similar this week:

QuantWare ($178 Million Series B): €152 million ($178 million). To build the “KiloFab,” aimed at being the world’s largest dedicated quantum open architecture fab, increasing production capacity by 20x. Developing VIO™ technology for 10,000-qubit processors to enable industrial-scale production. Led by Intel Capital with participation from In-Q-Tel (IQT) and Forward.one.

Quantum Motion ($160 Million Series C) $160 million (£117.5m). To commercialize their silicon-based quantum processor technology designed to fit in standard data center racks. Using standard CMOS silicon transistor technology to drastically reduce cost and energy usage (up to 1,000-fold). Co-led by DCVC and Kembara (Mundi Ventures). Other investors included the British Business Bank, Firgun, and existing backers like Bosch Ventures and Porsche Automobil Holding SE. Yes. The same CMOS architecture Diraq is using above. If last year was the year of neutral atom arrays, is this the year of silicon based qubits?

On the strategic partnership front, Quantinuum and BMW Group put ink on a multi-year expansion of their already-mature collaboration targeting advanced materials science for sustainable mobility—moving from algorithm pilots to simulating molecular systems with clear industrial links. BMW will pilot upcoming generations of Quantinuum systems as they arrive, aiming for progress in catalyst chemistry and fuel cell design. Nvidia is building out the quantum ecosystem not with new hardware, but by cementing itself as the connective tissue. Its new Ising AI family promises a threefold jump in quantum error correction—potentially the difference between toy computations and something you’d let near real-world data. On the user interface side, Bloq Quantum launched a drag-and-drop platform designed to let firms and universities cook up quantum experiments with less pain and tedious config wrangling. And for a final technical flourish, CAS Cold Atom Technology in China rolled out the Hanyuan-2, pegged as the world’s first dual-core neutral atomic quantum computer. Its 200-qubit system splits the load between rubidium-85 and rubidium-87 atoms, opening a new front in neutral atom architectures.

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Hadamard Gate

Latest strip published May 10, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

Quantum computers manipulate qubits through operations called gates, and the Hadamard is one of the most important. It is often the first operation in a quantum algorithm, and understanding it unlocks much of what follows in this book. Here is The post Hadamard Gate first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

Q-CTRL achieves 3,000x speedup over classical methods in materials discovery using quantum computing, demonstrating practical quantum advantage

Q-CTRL announced a 3,000x speedup in materials discovery simulations relevant to the energy sector using IBM’s Quantum Platform, demonstrating practical quantum advantage over leading classical software. The Q-CTRL team leveraged its performance-management infrastructure software to run a 120-qubit quantum algorithm on the IBM Quantum Platform, completing a fermionic simulation in two minutes, compared to over 100 hours on state-of-the-art classical tools. The study compared quantum results to the Flatiron Institute’s TDVP tensor network software, showing significant quantum acceleration at accuracy levels meeting industry standards.

Read source

Cleveland Clinic, RIKEN, and IBM use quantum computers to simulate 12,635-atom protein, setting new record

Cleveland Clinic, RIKEN, and IBM have simulated a protein complex with 12,635 atoms, marking the largest biologically meaningful molecule modeled to date on quantum computers. This quantum-centric supercomputing approach improved simulation accuracy up to 210 times over six months and extends the practical applications of quantum hardware in life sciences. The breakthrough highlights quantum computing’s growing role in addressing complex drug discovery challenges and sets a new benchmark for quantum-classical workflows in biological research.

Read source

IBM marks ten years since launching the first cloud-accessible quantum computer, enabling global access and industry growth

IBM commemorates the tenth anniversary of launching the first cloud-accessible quantum computer, a milestone that catalyzed the transformation of quantum computing from an academic specialty to a burgeoning global industry. Since the 2016 debut, the ecosystem has matured to support industrial-scale hardware and enterprise workflows, exemplified by IBM Quantum Heron’s 156-qubit systems and a robust programming stack. Noteworthy contributors such as Global Data Quantum, Kipu Quantum, Q-CTRL, Boeing, and RIKEN attribute significant innovation and accessibility gains to IBM’s cloud-first approach.

Read source

Diraq achieves high-fidelity silicon spin qubits with full CMOS compatibility using standard semiconductor processes

Diraq attributes its edge in the quantum computing race to full CMOS compatibility, arguing that leveraging existing CMOS processes is essential for scaling quantum hardware to millions of qubits economically. Founded by Andrew Dzurak, who previously demonstrated the first CMOS-compatible silicon spin qubit at UNSW in 2014 and spun out Diraq in 2022, the company demonstrated a key milestone in September 2025: silicon spin qubits fabricated on imec’s 300 mm industrial pilot line using standard semiconductor tooling achieved over 99% fidelity across all operations. These results highlight Diraq’s ability to achieve fault-tolerant, uniform qubit performance with standard commercial manufacturing, positioning it strongly for utility-scale quantum computing.

Read source

QuantWare raises €152 million in record Series B round to accelerate industrial quantum processor production

QuantWare, a Delft-based industrial quantum processor company, has raised €152 million ($178 million) in a Series B round, the largest private investment to date for a dedicated quantum processor company. The funding follows QuantWare’s announcement of VIO-40K, a 10,000-qubit quantum processor architecture, and will support expansion through its KiloFab manufacturing facility, aimed at scaling production capacity by 20x. The round included new investors Intel Capital, IQT, and ETF Partners, with continued support from FORWARD.one and others.

Read source

Quantinuum and BMW Group sign multi-year partnership to advance quantum computing applications in materials science for mobility

Quantinuum and BMW Group have expanded their partnership into a formal multi-year collaboration, with the goal of advancing future mobility through quantum computing in advanced materials science. Since 2021, the two companies have progressed from foundational algorithm development to advanced simulations of molecular systems relevant to industrial chemistry and sustainable mobility. BMW Group will continue to access leading generations of Quantinuum’s quantum computers, moving from the current Helios system to the anticipated Sol and Apollo systems. This collaboration, described as one of the longest between a commercial enterprise and a quantum computing provider, aims to deliver industrially significant solutions, particularly in catalyst chemistry and fuel cell optimization.

Read source

Nvidia launches Ising AI model family to enhance quantum computing error correction and partners with IonQ for ecosystem integration

Nvidia is advancing its quantum computing strategy by building an infrastructure layer, notably the CUDA-Q platform and NVQLink networking system, to bridge classical and quantum systems. Rather than developing quantum hardware, Nvidia is enabling integration for specialists like IonQ, which uses trapped-ion qubits and has reported top performance metrics, including 99.99% two-qubit gate fidelity. Nvidia’s new Ising AI model family promises up to three times more accurate quantum error correction, positioning both companies favorably for accelerating quantum computing adoption. IonQ is benefiting from early adoption, government contracts, and partnerships such as with South Korea’s KISTI, leveraging Nvidia’s ecosystem for hybrid quantum-classical computing.

Read source

Bloq Quantum launches drag-and-drop platform to accelerate quantum computing use case development

Bloq Quantum, a startup founded by alumni from IISER launched a drag-and-drop quantum computing platform designed to help companies and universities develop and deploy quantum programs up to ten times faster than traditional methods. The platform offers a visual interface that centralizes quantum tools, automates technical setup, and integrates multiple SDKs and hardware, significantly reducing manual workload. Currently, priority access is available for universities and corporate research teams, while individual researcher access is expected soon.

Read source

CAS Cold Atom Technology unveils Hanyuan-2, the world’s first dual core neutral atomic quantum computer

CAS Cold Atom Technology, a Chinese company based in Wuhan, has unveiled the Hanyuan-2, the world’s first dual core neutral atomic quantum computer. Announced on Thursday, the Hanyuan-2 incorporates a dual core system consisting of 100 rubidium-85 and 100 rubidium-87 atoms, totaling 200 qubits, utilizing China’s self-developed neutral atom array technology. The integrated, cabinet-style design is energy-efficient, requiring less than 7 kilowatts, and functions without ultra-low temperature environments, reducing practical deployment costs.

Read source

Quantum Motion raises $160 million to develop quantum computers using standard silicon transistors

Quantum Motion, a London-based company, has raised $160 million to advance the development of quantum computers using standard silicon chipmaking techniques. The company aims to create quantum computers that are smaller, cheaper, and more energy efficient by adapting traditional transistors, commonly found in conventional chips, into high-quality qubits. The funding round was co-led by DCVC and Kembara, with participation from British Business Bank, Firgun, and several existing investors including Oxford Science Enterprises and Bosch Ventures.

Read source

SafeLogic launches Cryptography Maturity Action Plan framework for post-quantum cryptography readiness

SafeLogic has introduced the Cryptography Maturity Action Plan (CMAP), an actionable framework aimed at guiding organizations toward post-quantum cryptography (PQC) readiness. The plan encompasses 12 core practices spanning executive strategy to technical implementation and continuous monitoring. CMAP offers a four-level maturity model, assisting organizations in systematically assessing, prioritizing, and executing their transition to PQC across governance, risk, technology, and operations.

Read source

More links this week (7)

• Bhubaneswar targets global quantum hub status with $2 billion R&D corridor—ambition meets infrastructure, not qubits

• Xanadu Quantum Technologies share price falls 65% after large insider share resale

• Ericsson unveils quantum-inspired algorithms for radio access network planning, claims 40% optimization in resource allocation

• Peter Sarlin’s QuTwo reaches $380 million valuation after $29 million angel round

• IonQ Launches Commercial InSAR Capability, Enabling Automated, Millimeter-Scale Earth Monitoring

• Frostbyte secures funding from Graduate Ventures to tackle quantum hardware scaling bottlenecks with novel error mitigation approach

Let us cut through it: Another week, another parade of quantum headlines—some pushing real technical substance, others circling in the press release fog, and a few reminding us why scientific adulthood means asking hard questions. Craig Gidney sets the skeptical tone right out of the gate with a post-mortem on the much-touted QDay Prize. The University of Oxford’s team makes a technical leap with the first experimental observation of ‘quadsqueezing.’ By wrangling non-commutativity and stacking multiple control forces, Oxford researchers wrung fourth-order quantum interactions from a trapped ion, more than 100 times faster than traditional squeezing methods. Meanwhile, MIT and IBM (among other institutions) have doubled down on their mutual ambitions—launching the MIT-IBM Computing Research Lab. Moving beyond their historic Watson partnership, the new lab will coordinate research across artificial intelligence and quantum computing, tying into MIT’s broader strategic initiatives for talent development and cross-discipline innovation. Shifting to the commercial front, QuantumCore has landed a healthy $1.7 million via NSERC’s Alliance Quantum grant to scale up its superconducting traveling-wave parametric amplifier work in partnership with the Institute for Quantum Computing. Quantum Art’s Series A now stands at a robust $140 million, fueled by a stable of venture supporters. Its ‘Perspective’ multicore trapped-ion architecture claims a pathway past the 1,000-qubit barrier by letting ion chains dance around dynamically. IQM Quantum Computers put an important pin on the map, securing Japan’s first enterprise quantum hardware sale: a 20-qubit system for TOYO Corporation, with both on-premises and cloud access. Over in Brussels, the European Commission has established its Quantum Computing Advisory Board (Q-CAB), helmed by Peter Zoller. The Board’s mandate is to offer technology-neutral advice on Europe’s quantum journey, develop public benchmarks, and lay groundwork for procurement and standards—sober, much-needed scaffolding for the continent’s quantum ecosystem as planning lurches toward the post-noisy era. Groove Quantum, meanwhile, puts precision hardware claims on the table with news of an 18-qubit germanium-based semiconductor spin-qubit processor—supposedly the world’s largest with this tech. Backed by €16 million in funding, Groove aims to ratchet up device scale and move to industry-grade manufacturing with help from major foundries. Here is the important part: if this path holds, mainstream chip manufacturing could finally get a foothold on quantum fabrication. Zoom out, and the global investment arms race shows no sign of letting up. According to Qureca, governments worldwide have now announced over $65.9 billion in quantum science commitments through 2026, with big ticket items from Australia, Austria, Brazil, and beyond. Everyone wants to play; the leaderboard, however, is crowded with promised budgets, not delivered results.

McKinsey Quantum Technology Monitor 2026 | McKinsey

Once more year, McKinsey renews their Quantum Technology Monitor. But if your coherence time is not that long, here is your pirate’s ready summary:

Quantum Pirates take: quantum is no longer “science fair with dilution fridges”

McKinsey’s Quantum Technology Monitor 2026 lands with a clear message: the quantum market has moved from “cool demo, bro” to “somebody is writing real budget checks.” The report calls this a commercial tipping point, and for once, that phrase is not entirely consultant-confetti.

Quick recap

More than 300 organizations are now working with quantum technology companies. McKinsey analyzed 162 of them in detail. The surprise: this is no longer mostly governments, labs, and PhDs in black turtlenecks. 72% of analyzed quantum computing customers are privately owned companies, and Europe leads adoption with 43% of the sample.

The big number: quantum computing could create $1.3 trillion to $2.7 trillion in economic value by 2035. That is the pirate treasure map. But buried treasure still requires a shovel, a ship, and not believing every parrot with a roadmap.

Where the money is going

Companies are not just “exploring.” They are spending. About one-third of surveyed companies spent more than $10 million on quantum computing initiatives in 2025, and 7% spent more than $50 million.

The money is mostly going to:

• use-case development,

• integration with existing tech stacks,

• internal capability building.

Notably, most enterprises are not buying quantum hardware. They are leaning toward quantum-as-a-service, because owning a quantum computer today is a bit like buying a dragon: impressive, expensive, and bad for facilities management.

The three hottest use-case zones

1. Chemicals and life sciences
This is still the most credible “real quantum value” arena. Molecular simulation, materials discovery, drug screening. Classical methods approximate too much; quantum may eventually model physics more directly.

2. Travel, transport, and logistics
Optimization is the eternal quantum temptation. Routing, scheduling, supply chains, constraints. The near-term pattern is hybrid: let classical systems do most of the work, then throw the quantum goblin at the nastiest subproblem.

3. Financial services
Risk modeling, portfolio optimization, AI, cryptography, and the looming “Q-Day” problem. Finance is both excited and terrified, which is basically its default emotional state.

Investment: the rum is flowing

Quantum technology start-up investment hit $12.6 billion in 2025, which McKinsey says is 6.3x higher than 2024. Around 90% of that went to quantum computing.

But here is the catch: the money is concentrating. Roughly 60% of 2025 investment went into the top ten deals. That means the industry is starting to look less like a thousand garage experiments and more like a capital-intensive platform race.

IonQ appears as the consolidation kraken, acquiring or taking stakes in Qubitekk, Lightsynq, Capella Space, Oxford Ionics, Vector Atomic, ID Quantique, and potentially SkyWater. Translation: the market is entering its “eat or be eaten” phase.

The actual market: smaller than the hype, bigger than the hobby

McKinsey separates the huge “economic value” number from the actual internal quantum technology market: hardware, software, and services.

By 2035, that market could reach $60 billion to $100 billion, with quantum computing accounting for $43 billion to $71 billion.

That is much more sober than “quantum will eat all computing,” but still large enough to matter.

The real technical story

The bottleneck is shifting. It is no longer just “how many qubits?” The hard stuff is now:

• error correction,

• logical qubits,

• cryogenics,

• lasers,

• control electronics,

• manufacturing,

• supply chains,

• reliability,

• integration.

In other words: quantum is leaving the physics lab and entering the factory. And factories are where PowerPoint dreams go to get punched in the mouth.

McKinsey is right to flag that roadmaps remain uncertain. Providers talk about hundreds, thousands, even hundreds of thousands of logical qubits in the coming years, but timelines for fault tolerance are still slippery. The sober pirate translation: progress is real; certainty is fake.

The most important sentence, in pirate form

The near-term path is not “quantum replaces classical computing.” It is:

Classical computing does the heavy lifting. AI helps orchestrate. Quantum attacks the weird, hard, ugly subproblem.

That hybrid model is the bridge between today’s limited machines and tomorrow’s possibly useful monsters.

Pirate verdict

This report is bullish, but not stupidly bullish. The signal is clear: quantum is becoming commercial. Budgets are real. Use cases are sharpening. The stack is forming. Investors are back with cannons loaded. But the warning is equally clear: most value is still ahead, not here. Roadmaps are not guarantees. Hybrid is the real game. And anyone promising magical enterprise advantage next quarter should be gently escorted off the plank.

Final take: quantum has crossed from “watch list” to “capability-building agenda.” Not because it is ready to replace classical computing, but because the companies that learn now may own the workflows, talent, IP, and partnerships when the machines finally stop being expensive physics pets and start becoming business weapons.

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Quantum Teleportation

Latest strip published May 3, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

Quantum teleportation transfers the exact quantum state of one particle to another particle at a distant location, without physically moving anything between them. Despite the name, it has nothing to do with science fiction transportation. It is a precisely defined The post Quantum Teleportation first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

Craig Gidney criticizes QDay Prize for rewarding a submission that did not demonstrate genuine quantum advantage

Craig Gidney critically analyzes the QDay Prize, a competition awarding 1 bitcoin to the largest instance of Shor’s algorithm run on contemporary quantum hardware, concluding it predictably failed due to two core issues: the lack of error correction in current hardware and the irrelevance of solving small cryptographic problems. Gidney notes the winning submission succeeded using a ‘Falling with Style-style trick,’ where results from a random number generator were indistinguishable from those labeled as quantum computing, highlighting fundamental flaws in the competition design and judging. Despite Project11’s mission to promote open benchmarking, Gidney believes the prize highlighted misleading narratives around quantum cryptanalysis progress.

Read source

MIT and IBM launch MIT-IBM Computing Research Lab to advance artificial intelligence and quantum computing

MIT and IBM have launched the MIT-IBM Computing Research Lab, evolving from their previous Watson AI Lab collaboration, to expand joint research in artificial intelligence, algorithms, and quantum computing. The new lab aims to accelerate the convergence of AI and quantum technologies for applications beyond the reach of classical computing, with leadership from both MIT and IBM, including Jay Gambetta, Anantha Chandrakasan, and co-directors Aude Oliva and David Cox. The initiative will also integrate with MIT’s strategic Generative AI and Quantum initiatives, foster talent training, and advance research with broad potential for industries ranging from life sciences to finance.

Read source

• IBM renews strategic partnerships with MIT, ETH Zurich, and University of Illinois to advance quantum and AI computing

• Harvard researchers and alumni advance quantum computing commercialization ahead of expectations

University of Oxford researchers achieve first experimental demonstration of quadsqueezing quantum interaction

Researchers at the University of Oxford have achieved the first-ever experimental demonstration of ‘quadsqueezing’, a fourth-order quantum interaction, using a single trapped ion. By combining two carefully controlled forces in their experimental setup, the team generated increasingly complex squeezed states, including squeezing, trisqueezing, and quadsqueezing, more than 100 times faster than with conventional techniques. This approach leverages non-commutativity to enable interactions previously considered too weak to observe.

Read source

QuantumCore secures $1.7 million NSERC grant to develop quantum amplifiers with Institute for Quantum Computing

QuantumCore Inc. has strengthened its partnership with the Institute for Quantum Computing (IQC) at the University of Waterloo by becoming an industry partner in NSERC’s Alliance Quantum grant program, securing up to $1.7 million in non-dilutive funding. This grant enables QuantumCore to accelerate the development of its superconducting traveling-wave parametric amplifier (TWPA) platform, critical for advancing superconducting quantum computers.

Read source

Mandeville Ventures signs definitive agreement to acquire Quantropi Inc. in qualifying transaction - I.e. Another SPAC

Mandeville Ventures Inc. (TSXV: MAND.P), a capital pool company listed on the TSX Venture Exchange announced that, further to its press releases of December 29, 2025, March 31, 2026 and April 17, 2026, it has entered into a definitive amalgamation agreement with Quantropi Inc, an Ottawa-based cybersecurity company focused on quantum-secure data communications, dated April 24, 2026 . The Proposed Transaction is conditional upon the completion by Quantropi of the private placement of equity securities for gross proceeds of not less than US$2 million, of which approximately US$700,000 has been raised to date by Quantropi. Quantropi also plans to raise up to an additional US$5.0 million in equity financing that would be completed concurrently with the Proposed Transaction

Read source

Quantum Art raises $140 million to advance scalable multicore quantum computing architecture

Quantum Art Ltd., a quantum computing startup, has extended its Series A funding round to $140 million to accelerate scaling efforts through its innovative ‘Perspective’ multicore trapped-ion architecture. The round, which follows an initial $100 million led by Bedford Ridge Capital, expanded with investments from Hudson Bay Capital, Poalim Equity, LIP Ventures, Wolverine Global Ventures, and IDA Ventures. Quantum Art’s system enables dynamic reconfiguration of ion chains for improved scalability and computational throughput, aiming to significantly surpass the 1,000-qubit barrier.

Read source

IQM Quantum Computers to deploy 20-qubit quantum system for TOYO Corporation in Japan’s first enterprise purchase

IQM Quantum Computers has announced the sale and upcoming deployment of its 20-qubit Radiance quantum computer to TOYO Corporation, marking the first enterprise quantum computer purchase in Japan. The system will be available on both premises and via cloud, expected for delivery by the end of 2026. This matters because this move expands IQM’s presence in Asia-Pacific, where it already has systems in South Korea and Taiwan right before their SPAC-IPO.

Read source

European Commission launches Quantum Computing Advisory Board to provide independent guidance on quantum technologies

The European Commission has launched the Quantum Computing Advisory Board (Q-CAB) to provide independent, platform-agnostic advice on quantum computing in Europe. The Board, chaired by prof. Peter Zoller, consists of leading European experts including prof. David DiVincenzo and dr. Michael Bolle, and will coordinate with the European Commission and other major European initiatives. Q-CAB’s mandate includes developing assessment criteria, advising on industrialization steps, and informing investment, procurement, and standards decisions as quantum technologies move from the NISQ era toward fault-tolerant systems within two to three years.

Read source

Groove Quantum raises €16 million after demonstrating 18-qubit semiconductor spin-qubit processor

Groove Quantum, a quantum computing company spun out of QuTech, has secured €16 million in seed funding after demonstrating an 18-qubit semiconductor spin-qubit processor. The funding round was co-led by Innovation Industries and 55 North, alongside contributions from Verve Ventures and €7.5 million in equity from the European Innovation Council Fund, with an additional €2.5 million EIC Accelerator grant. Groove Quantum’s processor uses germanium-based technology that leverages standard semiconductor manufacturing processes, supporting scalable and high-fidelity quantum systems. The new capital will enable Groove Quantum to increase qubit counts, expand their team, and initiate industrial-scale manufacturing at major foundries.

Read source

Qureca report: Countries worldwide announce over $65.9 billion in quantum technology investments through 2026

Qureca has updated their survey of global quantum initiatives, reporting that worldwide investments in quantum science and technology have surpassed $65.9 billion. The narrative outlines individual country efforts through 2026, including Australia’s AU$893 million public investment and the announcement of an additional AU$101.2 million over five years. Austria has committed €107 million through the Quantum Austria initiative, while Brazil’s collective funding for quantum programs totals over R$430 million, notably with leadership from institutions like Embrapii and Senai Cimatec.

Read source

Cloudflare makes post-quantum encryption for IPsec generally available

Cloudflare has announced the general availability of post-quantum encryption for its IPsec product, moving towards its goal of full post-quantum security by 2029. Using the IETF draft standard for hybrid ML-KEM (FIPS 203), Cloudflare has demonstrated interoperability with branch connectors from Fortinet (FortiOS 7.6.6+) and Cisco (8000 Series Secure Routers v26.1.1+). This matters the new solution protects against harvest-now-decrypt-later attacks and does not require specialized hardware, operating via software on standard processors.

Read source

US House committee advances National Quantum Initiative Reauthorization Act, highlighting IBM, IonQ, and Cisco as key beneficiaries

The passage of H.R. 8462, the National Quantum Initiative Reauthorization Act, by the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology signals a meaningful shift in U.S. quantum policy at a critical juncture for the industry (Science Space and Technology). While the original 2018 framework focused on building foundational research capabilities, the updated bill places far greater emphasis on commercialization, workforce readiness and interagency coordination- factors that could begin translating quantum potential into tangible economic activity as early as 2026.

Read source

More links this week

• IonQ and Florida LambdaRail announce statewide quantum-safe network initiative in Florida

• and Einride demonstrate hybrid quantum-classical optimization to improve electric and autonomous freight dispatch efficiency

• Haiqu and HSBC demonstrate scalable quantum encoding for financial models with 20x data compression—impressive algorithmic move, but commercial payoff remains speculative

• IBM CEO Arvind Krishna commits to delivering large-scale fault-tolerant quantum computer by 2029

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Quantum Measurement

Latest strip published April 26, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

Carpenters say “measure twice, cut once.” Quantum physicists would say “measure once, and whatever you had is gone.” Measurement in quantum mechanics isn’t a gentle peek at what’s inside. It’s the end of the road for the superposition you worked The post Quantum Measurement first appeared on quantumbitscomics.com .

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

Research & Papers (5)

New findings and reproducible technical results.

[PAPER] Q-MONSTAR Consortium Embeds Fault-Tolerant Quantum Platform Into Oncology Data Pipeline—Aims to Tackle 1,000-Year HPC Challenges, Delivers Infrastructure, Not Breakthroughs

The Q-MONSTAR consortium claims to be the first global proof-of-concept platform embedding fault-tolerant quantum computing within a live clinical research infrastructure for precision oncology. The consortium integrates fault-tolerant quantum computing methodology with SCRUM-Japan’s large-scale, clinically validated multi-omics cancer data, aiming to address computationally intractable problems such as protein conformational dynamics and quantum effects in drug binding—tasks that would take over 1,000 years on conventional high-performance computing. This matters because this matters because this is a credible step toward testing whether quantum computing can actually move the needle in real-world cancer drug discovery, but so far, the work is infrastructure and ambition—no clinical or computational breakthroughs reported yet.

Read source

QuEra, Harvard, and MIT slash quantum error correction overhead to 2x with neutral atom simulation—580 logical qubits packed into 1,152 physical, logical error rates hit 1.3 × 10⁻¹³

QuEra, in collaboration with Harvard and Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has demonstrated a breakthrough in quantum error correction efficiency, publishing a simulation result that encodes 580 logical qubits into just 1,152 physical qubits, achieving an encoding rate just over one half (0.503), with logical error rates as low as 1.3 × 10⁻¹³ per operation—squarely in the so-called Teraquop regime. Most current architectures limp along with rates between one tenth and one hundredth, demanding armies of physical qubits for a single dependable logical bit and putting practical large-scale quantum computing hopelessly out of reach. This matters because this matters because the team’s codes, rooted in a 2026 theoretical advance by Kasai, bend the iron law of low-rate quantum LDPC codes by using affine permutation matrices instead of circulant ones, then matched these to the reconfigurable constraints of neutral atom hardware.

Read source

[PAPER] Harvard and MIT Researchers Unveil Parallelized Neutral Atom Architecture: 3× Faster Quantum Simulations with Just 11,495 Qubits and >94% Success—Backed by End-to-End Benchmarks, Not Hype

The authors present a parallelized extractor-based architecture for fault-tolerant quantum computing on neutral atom systems, achieving up to a 3× speedup in execution time over prior extractor schemes—without increasing qubit overhead—and outperforming transversal and hybrid architectures in overall spacetime efficiency for key quantum simulation benchmarks. Explicit end-to-end simulations show quantum advantage can be reached for dynamics simulations (e.g., 2D Ising and Fermi-Hubbard models) with as few as 11,495 atoms and runtimes as low as ~15 hours, maintaining high success probabilities (>94%) and requiring an order of magnitude fewer qubits than transversal approaches. This matters because this matters because this work cuts through the usual resource-estimation fog by providing concrete, simulation-backed targets for early, scientifically meaningful quantum advantage on neutral atom hardware—while exposing the fragility of hybrid and transversal schemes when real-world spacetime and error budgets are considered.

Read source

National Physical Laboratory automates quantum calibration with NVIDIA Ising AI, slashing manual tuning in UK hardware scale-up push

NPL has just slotted NVIDIA’s Ising AI into the heart of its quantum computer calibration workflow, pitching artificial intelligence against one of quantum’s most tedious bottlenecks: making sure qubits actually behave. The United Kingdom’s National Physical Laboratory, sitting in its usual spot as metrology referee, is targeting the gnarly headache of qubit stability—the sort of detail that makes or breaks scalable quantum gear. This matters because this matters because on top of that, NPL teamed up on a benchmarking suite to stress-test these AI methods, putting machine learning’s claims of speed and insight to the test against noise and real-world hardware quirks.

Read source

Industry & Investment (5)

Commercial launches, partnerships, funding, and market moves.

Orange Quantum Systems lands €15 million seed extension to ramp automated chip testing, with Rigetti, QuantWare, and Peak Quantum aboard

Delft’s Orange Quantum Systems just extended its Seed round to €15 million—with an infusion from the European Innovation Council Fund—eyeing the brutal bottleneck in quantum chip testing as quantum hardware crawls toward commercial scale. Since 2020, the Dutch company has been building a suite of testing systems, from its flagship high-throughput OrangeQS MAX to the open-source OrangeQS Juice OS, and tailoring tools like FLEX and consultancy under Quantum Care. This matters because this matters because now for the bit people conveniently ignore: testing infrastructure is often the unglamorous, underfunded stepchild of quantum hype, but it is the difference between laboratory optimism and commercial reliability.

Read source

Kvantify and Equal1 ink partnership to tackle drug discovery with CMOS silicon spin qubits and tailored quantum algorithms—betting on real life-sciences utility over broad “NISQ for everything” talk

Kvantify and Equal1 have joined forces to push past the quantum hand-waving, announcing a partnership to integrate Equal1’s CMOS-based quantum hardware with Kvantify’s application-specific quantum algorithms for the life sciences sector. Unlike the usual “framework” and “roadmap” pronouncements, this deal has an explicit technical focal point: using Equal1’s silicon spin qubit platform, which houses all control electronics on a single chip, Kvantify will develop algorithms targeting real-life applications in drug discovery and molecular simulation.

Read source

Alice & Bob snaps up 100+ quantum specialists in seven months—31 nationalities, 79 PhDs, defying global tech slowdown Hook

Alice & Bob just pulled off a rare feat in today’s limping tech job market, adding over 100 employees in seven months and pushing its headcount to 251—completing its hiring plan a full 30% ahead of schedule. This stands in stark contrast to both France’s sluggish labor landscape, where hiring is 30% below pre-pandemic benchmarks (according to the January 2026 LinkedIn Labour Market Report), and ongoing global tech layoffs. This matters because this matters because that’s changing where we find talent and how people move into quantum from adjacent industries.” The company says this hiring burst underpins its next wave of R&D and commercial scaling, particularly as it pursues its universal, fault-tolerant “Graphene” machine featuring 100 high-fidelity logical qubits.

Read source

IonQ unveils “buildable blueprint” for fault-tolerant quantum computing with 99.99% gate fidelity and remote entanglement

IonQ has thrown its hat down with the release of what it calls a “definitive, full-stack, buildable blueprint” for scaling to fault-tolerant quantum computers with 10,000 physical qubits and beyond. Published on April 22, 2026, the report claims a level of engineering detail and transparency not previously seen in the sector—a rare move given the usual fog of PR gloss and aspirational roadmaps. This matters because central to IonQ’s case are real, hard-won results: the company asserts it has achieved 99.99% two-qubit gate fidelity and first-of-class ion entanglement across remote traps, milestones necessary for any credible push beyond noisy prototypes.

Read source

Zapata Quantum lands $15 million funding after restructuring, doubles down on hardware-agnostic software and enterprise deployments

Zapata Quantum is not dead! The team has secured an oversubscribed $15 million financing round, led by Triatomic Capital, capping a year-long restructuring effort and fueling its ambition to scale as a hardware-agnostic quantum software provider. This funding round, backed by strategic investors, is billed as a vote of confidence in Zapata’s technical discipline and its portfolio of more than 60 granted and pending patents. This matters because CEO Sumit Kapur characterizes the raise as “jet fuel” for Zapata’s drive to bridge the persistent gap between quantum hardware breakthroughs and production-ready enterprise applications—a gap routinely glossed over in flashier PR.

Read source

Policy & Security (2)

Government policy, standards, regulation, and security posture.

Filippo Valsorda demolishes AES-128 quantum panic with math—Grover’s algorithm leaves 2¹⁰⁴ security intact

Filippo Valsorda, cryptography engineer, has drawn a sharp line under a persistent misconception in quantum circles: AES 128 is not on the endangered species list, even in a post-quantum world. Despite a steady drip of folklore claiming quantum attacks (specifically via Grover’s algorithm) halve AES 128’s effective security, the reality is much less dramatic. This matters because this matters because grover’s algorithm is famously non-parallelizable—its supposed “square root speedup” collapses as you try to scale.

Read source

European Union mandates post-quantum cryptography migration, turning quantum risk into compliance reality for critical infrastructure

European policymakers have officially shifted gears on quantum security, with the European Union rolling out preparations for a post-quantum era that’s finally getting political teeth. Bottom line: Europe has decided to legislate first, engineer second—meaning post-quantum compliance just became a regulatory inevitability for anyone with data to lose or an audit to pass. This matters because this matters because in real terms: this is bureaucracy and compliance machinery moving, not a hardware breakthrough or research leap.

Read source

More links this week (8)

• New York University and Qunnect complete three-node quantum entanglement network across live NYC fiber, hitting 1.5 polarization swaps per second

• Filippo Valsorda debunks quantum apocalypse panic: Grover’s algorithm leaves AES-128 unscathed, real-world cryptography stands firm against quantum hype

• Quantum Computing Inc. touts “deployment-ready” NeuraWave photonic AI hardware—commercial launch, zero real specs

• Quantinuum files confidential US IPO after $300 million Honeywell backing—hard numbers missing, public valuation up next

• National Quantum Algorithm Center at Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park funds five postdoc-driven quantum industry pilots targeting energy, health, and materials—real deployment, not hype

• PsiQuantum and Xanadu double down on optical interconnects for scalable quantum, but fidelity bottlenecks shadow multi-fridge blueprints

• Quantum Advisory Council warns blockchain’s quantum risk is real but distant—6.9 million Bitcoin keys vulnerable, post-quantum overhaul urgent despite decade-long runway

• University of Basel and Aalto University demonstrate quantum state transfer between superconducting qubits and magnons in cryogenic YIG setup—practical hybrid coupling at millikelvin temperatures with hardware

State of the Global Quantum Industry 2026

QED-C dropped its State of the Global Quantum Industry 2026 overview, and the message is clear: quantum is growing up. This is not the full kitchen-sink forecast deck, but the industry scorecard and methodology booklet that sets the baseline for the rest of QED-C’s 2026 analysis. It tracks the sector across five big buckets: composition, market, workforce, investment, and intellectual property.

The headline numbers are solid. QED-C counts 7,420 quantum-engaged organizations, including 556 pure-play quantum companies, and estimates a 2025 market size of $1.9B, with $1.4B from quantum computing and $470M from quantum sensing. It also reports 16,482 pure-play workers, 8,261 new quantum-related openings, $12.7B in new government funding commitments, $4.9B in new venture capital, and 69,807 active patents. In plain English: more companies, more hiring, more money, more patents, less “science fair,” more actual industry.
(The Quantum Pirate together with other experts estimated the pure-play workers at 6000 people worldwide just 5 years ago!)

The broader takeaway is that quantum is maturing, but not evenly. Computing still dominates revenue, sensing keeps building quietly, workforce growth is shifting toward operations and business roles, and capital is increasingly concentrating in firms that look more commercial and less experimental. So no, this report does not prove that useful quantum advantage is around the corner. But it does show that the ecosystem around it is getting denser, better funded, and harder to dismiss as a niche science project.

Download the report

Quantum Bits with Quantessa & Atomique

Entanglement

Latest strip published April 19, 2026 · by Yuval Boger

Entanglement is not just what happens when you pull your charging cables from your bag and find they are deeply connected. Some physicists would call that “string theory.” Quantessa explains what entanglement means in the quantum world. In 1935, Einstein,

Read the full comic on Quantum Bits Comics

Research & Papers (4)

Hybrid Quantum-Classical Workflows Dominate with 40% Research Share, 64% Year-on-Year Growth in 2025 ArXiV Papers, and Real Quantum Processor Training Costs Exceeding $1 Million

Amara Graps completed a review of 500 hybrid classical-quantum research papers, revealing that hybrid approaches accounted for approximately 40% of total research in the quantum technology sector, as indexed on ArXiV. Between 2021 and 2023, hybrid research output surged by around 50% per year, stabilizing at roughly 30 papers per month through June 2024. Graps highlights trends including the integration of quantum computing with high-performance computing centers, the critical role of Quantum Computing as a Service, and the growing overlap between quantum and artificial intelligence workflows.

Read source

[PAPER] Researchers Achieve Quantum Storage of Complete Bacteriophage phiX174 Genome with 99% Retrieval Fidelity on 16-Qubit Processor

Researchers successfully encoded and loaded the complete genome of bacteriophage phiX174 onto a quantum computer using quantum random access memory. The team demonstrated the storage of all 5,386 nucleotides of the phiX174 genome in a quantum state on a 16-qubit quantum processor, verifying retrieval fidelity above 99%. This work establishes a proof-of-principle for quantum storage of large-scale biological data, highlighting both the feasibility and current limitations in scaling quantum memory for genomics applications. Recent newsletters in this area show steady momentum and continued validation of practical quantum use cases.

Read source

University of Oxford teleports quantum gate between two trapped-ion computers at 86.2% fidelity over two-meter network

Researchers at the University of Oxford have achieved quantum gate teleportation between two quantum computers, pushing the frontiers of distributed quantum computing. Each module housed a strontium ion as the network qubit for light-based communication, and a calcium ion as the circuit qubit, with the quantum link established by emitting photons to a central Bell-state analyzer to generate entanglement. This matters because this matters because scaling up quantum computers remains a formidable technical challenge, but this shows the path forward.” The key achievement is clear: Oxford’s team has demonstrated that modular, photonically linked quantum computers can execute non-trivial algorithms across separate hardware, a milestone toward scaling quantum architectures by distribution rather than monolithic design

Read source

C12 unveils decade roadmap for carbon nanotube quantum processors: targeting 100,000+ physical qubits and 800 logical qubits in single cryogenic system by 2033

Paris-based quantum computing startup C12 unveiled its technological roadmap on April 15, outlining a four-step plan to scale carbon nanotube-based quantum processors from proof-of-concept to a market-ready system by 2033. Led by CEO Pierre Desjardins, C12 aims to release its first chip capable of logical quantum operations, dubbed Aïdôs, by 2027, then move to modular architectures with 236 physical and 8 logical qubits (Zélos, 2030), ramping up to 8,500 physical and 128 logical qubits (Styx, 2032), and ultimately achieving over 100,000 physical qubits with approximately 800 logical qubits in a single cryogenically-cooled system, Panopeia, by 2033. This strategy is intended to match the pace of the United States Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s Quantum Benchmarking Initiative.

Read source

Industry & Investment (8)

Commercial launches, partnerships, funding, and market moves.

BMO launches institute and partners with Quantum Industry Canada and Chicago Quantum Exchange to accelerate financial sector quantum adoption across North America

BMO announced on April 13, 2026, a dual partnership with Quantum Industry Canada and the Chicago Quantum Exchange, marking the bank’s expanded engagement with North America’s key quantum research and commercialization organizations. Anchored by the newly launched BMO Institute for Applied Artificial Intelligence & Quantum, these collaborations reinforce BMO’s commitment to integrating quantum technologies into financial services, focusing on early-stage ecosystem development, workforce training, and cross-sector knowledge exchange.

Read source

Deteqt secures $5 million seed to scale diamond chip quantum magnetometers after US military deploys ‘Ghost Murmur’ for remote heartbeat detection

Australian quantum sensing company Deteqt has secured $5 million in seed funding, propelled by international interest following the deployment of its quantum magnetometry technology during a recent US military rescue mission in Iran. The company’s technology is distinguished by its commercial traction and rapid development, achieving significant milestones in less than 18 months. This funding round, led by Main Sequence with support from ATP Fund, BOKA Capital, Beaten Zone Venture Partners, Uniseed, and the University of Sydney, will enable Deteqt to advance its compact, diamond chip-based quantum magnetic sensors toward field-ready status, scale diamond chip manufacturing, and expand its team.

Read source

Quantum Economic Development Consortium reports global quantum industry surpasses $1.9B market size in 2025, driven by 14% organizational growth and $12.7B new government funding

At the close of 2025, the quantum technology industry exhibited robust growth, with clear signs of maturing market structure, technical progress, and increasing strategic priority on a global scale, according to the State of the Global Quantum Industry 2026 report from the Quantum Economic Development Consortium. The total number of quantum-engaged organizations worldwide reached 7,420, a 14% increase over 2024, and the count of pure-play quantum companies climbed 8% to 556. This matters because this matters because government commitments surged with $12.7 billion in new public funding—marking a 310% jump from 2024—while private venture capital followed suit, delivering $4.9 billion in new investment, up 192% year-on-year.

Read source

France unveils Lucy photonic quantum computer at Très Grand Centre de Calcul, delivering sovereign European HPC-quantum hybrid with free access for industry and academia

Lucy, the world’s most powerful photonic quantum computer, was inaugurated at the Très Grand Centre de Calcul by Anne Le Hénanff, Minister Delegate for Artificial Intelligence and Digital Affairs, and Bruno Bonnell, Secretary General for Investment. Developed by Quandela in collaboration with German partner Attocube and procured by the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking through GENCI, Lucy is a product of the Franco-European consortium and exemplifies strategic Franco-German industrial cooperation in the quantum sector. This matters because this matters because this deployment, under France 2030’s national quantum strategy and the HQI programme, positions photonic quantum technology as a credible path toward industrial scalability, benefiting from easier qubit manipulation and seamless data center integration.

Read source

Peak Quantum secures €2.2 million pre-seed funding to develop integrated-error-resistant superconducting qubits and operate SUPREME quantum chip pilot line by 2026

Munich-based Peak Quantum has closed a €2.2 million pre-seed funding round, lifting its total financing to more than €5 million, to advance its hardware-centric approach to quantum processors. Unlike many in the industry who emphasize scaling qubit counts and rely on downstream error correction, Peak Quantum directly integrates error resistance into the physical architecture of its qubits, aiming to reduce system complexity and accelerate the path to industrial applications. This matters because this matters because the latest investment round, led by Cloudberry Ventures with participation from United Founders, QAI Ventures, Golden Egg Check, and multiple industry-experienced business angels, underlines the momentum behind European quantum hardware; public funding under the EU Chips Act further signals state-level strategic prioritization.

Read source

NVIDIA launches Ising open-source AI suite, accelerating quantum processor calibration 2.5x and boosting error-correction accuracy 3x over industry standard

NVIDIA has introduced Ising, the world’s first family of open-source AI models aimed at accelerating the development of practical quantum computers, providing significant advances in quantum processor calibration and error correction. According to the company’s announcement on April 14, 2026, NVIDIA Ising delivers calibration capabilities and quantum error-correction decoding that are up to 2.5 times faster and three times more accurate than existing methods like pyMatching, a widely used open-source standard. This matters because this matters because the Ising model suite includes a vision-language model for rapid interpretation and automated calibration of quantum processor data, reducing calibration cycles from days to hours, and two 3D convolutional neural network variants for real-time quantum error correction decoding, optimized for either speed or accuracy.

Read source

DARPA launches $68M HARQ program to unify superconducting, trapped-ion, and photonic qubits with MOSAIC and QSB architectures across 15 organizations

DARPA has launched the Heterogeneous Architectures for Quantum (HARQ) program to move quantum computing beyond the limitations of single-technology systems, aiming to create scalable, high-impact applications through heterogeneous quantum architectures. Led by Program Manager Justin Cohen, HARQ asserts that no single quantum bit, or qubit, technology provides all the essential properties needed for large-scale quantum systems and challenges the community to integrate multiple qubit types into unified systems, analogous to the heterogeneous processor landscape of classical computing. This matters because this matters because nineteen performer teams from fifteen organizations will pursue two parallel workstreams over the next 24 months: Multi-qubit Optimized Software Architecture through Interconnected Compilation (MOSAIC), which targets the development of circuit compilers and software frameworks to optimize quantum algorithms across different qubit types, and Quantum Shared Backbone (QSB), aiming to engineer high-fidelity hardware interconnects for communication between divergent qubit platforms. Notable participants include Infleqtion, MemQ, Q-CTRL, the University of Michigan, and IonQ, among leading research institutions such as Harvard University and Stanford University.

Read source

Sygaldry secures $139 million to accelerate proprietary quantum architectures for AI workloads, marking record-setting private investment in quantum hardware development

Sygaldry has secured $139 million in funding to accelerate the development of quantum computers tailored for artificial intelligence workloads. This significant investment marks one of the largest private capital infusions for a quantum-focused startup to date and reflects heightened interest in quantum hardware as a backbone for next-generation AI applications. With this funding, Sygaldry aims to advance its proprietary quantum architectures, though details on technical specifications or system benchmarks have not been disclosed.

Read source

More links this week (8)

• Jim Cramer names Google, IBM, and Honeywell as only credible quantum computing businesses, citing Honeywell’s 54% stake in Quantinuum

• Horizon Quantum and Alpine Quantum Technologies integrate trapped-ion hardware with cloud-based development tools, enabling direct deployment and accelerating real-world quantum applications for industry and research

• Hon Hai Quantum Computing Research Center launches 2025 quantum research dashboard ranking top topics and top 100 authors using SciRate data with 30+ citations

• University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign simulates 268-million-site quasicrystal using quantum-inspired algorithm, slashing computation time from years to minutes

• memQ leads DARPA quantum compiler project to optimize heterogeneous networks, targeting 1000x resource reduction with MIT, Yale, and University of Chicago

• IonQ unveils full-stack quantum benchmarking framework spanning 13 real-world workloads with independent Kearney validation and public Qiskit code

• John M. Willis finds quantum error correction drives heterogeneous, latency-dependent control stacks—AI/GPU decoders suit ions and neutral atoms, but photonics and superconductors require ultra-fast ASIC/FPGA architectures

• Fraunhofer Institute for Photonic Microsystems launches SPINS pilot line for industrial-scale semiconductor quantum chips across pan-European foundries