dougfinke

This contract from the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) will cover a four year period and will focus on research for creating hardware that can scale, network, and deploy multiple quantum systems. Part of the company's strategy is to scale larger quantum systems by using photonic networking and optical switching technologies to connect multiple computing modules together. It is the largest quantum contract awarded in the U.S. in 2024. Specific technologies included in this research include down conversion to convert the wavelengths of light used internally inside a quantum computer to a different wavelength more compatible with standard telecommunications equipment [...]

IBM has added an improved quantum computer to its fleet of machines installed at its data center in Poughkeepsie, New York. This processor is named Heron r2 and is an improvement to the predecessor version called Heron r1. The new Heron r2 contains a few more qubits, 156 versus 133, than the previous version. It also has better gate fidelities providing an Error per Layer Gate (EPLG) measurement of 0.4% versus the previous version's 0.7%. Besides these two Heron processors, the IBM Cloud also offers 10 additional units of the 127 qubit Eagle processors. However, not only do those Eagle systems [...]

Illinois Governor JB Pritzker, along with the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity (DCEO) and EeroQ, announced new investments in EeroQ’s quantum headquarters in Chicago’s Humboldt Park. EeroQ’s $1.1 million investment, supported by a Economic Development for a Growing Economy (EDGE) for Startups agreement and the Illinois Innovation Venture Fund (INVENT), aims to develop the team and tools needed to build a quantum computer. In 2022, EeroQ announced it was moving its corporate headquarters to Chicago, partly to take advantage of the strong quantum ecosystem that already existed there through the University of Chicago, the Chicago Quantum Exchange, the Fermi [...]

Ephos, a leading producer of glass-based photonic chips, has announced a major expansion with an $8.5 million funding round and the opening of a state-of-the-art research and manufacturing facility in Milan. This facility is the world’s first dedicated to producing glass-based quantum photonic circuits. The funding included contributions from the European Innovation Council (EIC) and NATO’s Defence Innovation Accelerator for the North Atlantic (DIANA), with Ephos being one of only 10 companies selected from over 1,300 applicants. They will also receive €450,000 ($500,000 USD) in non-dilutive funding over two phases. The seed round was led by Starlight Ventures, with additional participation [...]

By Amara Graps In my Part 1 article, I concluded that there are parts of the German Quantum Technology Ecosystem, that look fragmented. Those will have an effect on Investments; let’s take a look. Quantum Technology Investments in Germany In GQI’s Investment Tracker, you can isolate countries, and with calendar date periods, you can study that country’s quantum investment record for configured dates. Here is the full record for Germany: Figure. From GQI’s Investment Tracker where a country-by-country assessment can be made. (*) The “Investor’s Overview” above this screen a gives you a graphical view of the type and direction of [...]

One of the limiters in the adoption of quantum computing is what we see as the gap between the subject matter experts in an organization and the quantum computational scientists who better understand how quantum works. In order to lessen this gap IBM and its partners have just made some announcements that will improve the user experience with Qiskit by making it easier to use through additional functions and tools. These tools will make it quicker an easier to get the best results from the available quantum hardware. To do this, IBM has introduced a new capability called the Qiskit Functions Catalog. [...]

Many of the new announcements regarding advancements in quantum computing technology revolve around new milestones about the qubits or the discovery of new algorithms. However, another important area that is also continuing to improve is what GQI calls the MidStack. As can be seen in the picture above, this encompasses portions in the middle of the quantum stack that includes the Framework, Architecture, and Control Logic. (You can download several of the reports from GQI dealing with the MidStack from the GQI Reports page.) IBM and its partners have just made several announcements that will improve the user experience with Qiskit [...]

By Amara Graps Germans are Less Attached to their Quantum Computers “How important is it for you, where the quantum computer was developed?” might invoke forms of pride, if one was attached to the company, to the town, to the university (spin-off), or to the quantum computer’s country.   However, only about a quarter of the German respondents in QuEra’s July 2024 Survey felt that Germany producing its own QPU was important. See Figure 8 of the QuEra  Survey Report: The Current and Future State of Quantum Computing July 2024. Figure. Reproduced from Figure 8 from the QuEra:  Survey Report: The [...]

By Amara Graps French: Fewer in Surveyed-Number, but More Confident than the Germans “Confident” is how I would describe the French in Figure 5 of QuEra's recent  Survey Report: The Current and Future State of Quantum Computing. The question to the French respondents was How well-positioned is their country in the global quantum computing industry? They were fewer in number in the survey than the Germans by half, yet ~67% considered their country, very well positioned. On the other hand, the German respondents were more in number, but less confident: Only about 44% felt that Germany is very well positioned in [...]

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has announced a $65 million investment in quantum computing to fund 10 projects with a total of 38 separate awards over a five year period. Quantum computing aims to solve large, complex problems in modern science more quickly and efficiently, surpassing the limits of today’s largest supercomputers. This investment focuses on advancements in software, control systems, and algorithms to demonstrate quantum computing’s utility for scientific research within the DOE’s mission space. This investment aims to develop a software ecosystem ready for modularity, interoperability, specialization, and performance. The titles of the 10 projects include the following: [...]