TreQ, alongside Rigetti, Oxford Ionics, Q-CTRL, and Qruise, has been awarded £1.65 million ($2.2 million USD) from Innovate UK to develop an Open Architecture Quantum (OAQ) Testbed. The grant forms part of the Quantum Missions Pilot competition under the UK’s National Quantum Strategy, supporting projects that address technological barriers to quantum technology commercialization. Coordinated by TreQ, the consortium aims to design and operate a modular and extensible quantum system that integrates multiple processors, control systems, and software stacks to enable dynamic evaluation of quantum components and workflows.
The OAQ Testbed will initially support eight different system configurations by combining two quantum processors, two control systems, and two software platforms, allowing rapid switching between architectures for testing and development. Hardware contributions include the Rigetti Novera™ 9-qubit quantum processing unit, the QuantWare 5-qubit Soprano QPU, control systems from Quantum Machines and QBlox, and calibration technologies from Q-CTRL and Qruise. A major project milestone is the creation of an open specification for quantum workflow interfaces, enabling modular compilation and seamless execution of quantum programs across different quantum hardware technologies, starting with superconducting and trapped ion qubits.
The OAQ Testbed will be located at TreQ’s facility in Milton Park, Oxfordshire. Beyond enabling immediate hardware and software interoperability testing, the project seeks to foster greater supply chain cohesion within the quantum computing sector. Additional collaborators such as Oxford Ionics will contribute trapped ion technologies, expanding the diversity of systems supported. This project follows a second grant awarded to TreQ earlier this year under the Science and Technology Facilities Council’s innovation initiative, reinforcing the company’s position in developing bespoke, open-architecture quantum systems.
Read the full announcement here.
April 22, 2025
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