Quantum computing pioneer raises $450 million
The company said it plans to use the money to build the world’s first commercially viable quantum computer. It plans for this to have at least 1 million qubits to provide the error correction required.
The funds come from BlackRock, Baillie Gifford and Microsoft’s venture capital fund M12 plus new investors Blackbird Ventures and Temasek. PsiQuantum was founded in 2016 by four UK university physicists and has relocated to California where it has been able to raise $665 million to date.
Although the company is now based in Palo Alto O’Brien is still listed as a professor at the University of Bristol.
The company’s first quantum computer has been dubbed Q1 and is being developed by a growing team of engineers and scientists working on the entire quantum computing stack including photonic and electronic chips, through packaging and control electronics, cryogenic systems, quantum architecture and fault tolerance, to quantum applications.
“Quantum computing is the most profoundly world-changing technology uncovered to date,” said Jeremy O’Brien, CEO and co-founder of PsiQuantum, in a statement. “It is my conviction that the way to bring this technology into reality is by using photonics. Our company was founded on the understanding that leveraging semiconductor manufacturing is the only way to deliver the million qubits that are known to be required for error correction, a prerequisite for commercially valuable quantum computing applications.”
PsiQuantum is manufacturing quantum photonic chips, as well as the cryogenic electronic chips to control the qubits, using the facilities of partner company Globalfoundries.
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