U.S. Government to Award $2 Billion in Grants to Nine Quantum Computing Companies

U.S. Commerce Department is preparing to award $2 billion in grants from the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act to nine quantum computing companies. IBM is set to receive $1 billion of the total. GlobalFoundries is scheduled to receive $375 million. The remaining funds will go to seven other firms, with most receiving $100 million each and one startup receiving $38 million.

The department has agreed to give $1 billion of the package to IBM, a leader in the race to build computers that use quantum mechanics to solve problems much faster than traditional supercomputers. Chip maker GlobalFoundries is receiving $375 million in funding.

The rest of the firms are expected to receive $100 million, except for startup Diraq, which is slated to get $38 million. A slew of companies pursuing various approaches to quantum are slated to be awarded funds, including publicly traded firms D-Wave Quantum, Rigetti Computing and Infleqtion.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick stated that the Trump administration is leading the world into a new era of American innovation. The funding structure will include equity stakes for the government, following a similar approach used in other sectors.

In premarket trading, IBM rose 6%, D-Wave Quantum soared 19%, Rigetti Computing jumped 15%, and IONQ rose 9%. "Everybody is excited about quantum because it is the next big thing. A lot of the expectations and hopes have yet to be realized," said Dana Goward, president of the Resilient Navigation and Timing Foundation.