About PsiQuantum
PsiQuantum was founded in 2016 by Jeremy O'Brien, Pete Shadbolt, and Terry Rudolph, pursuing a distinctive approach to quantum computing hardware based on photonics, meaning using particles of light rather than superconducting circuits or trapped ions as the underlying physical mechanism for representing and manipulating quantum information, a strategic bet grounded in the belief that photonic quantum computing can be manufactured using existing, well-established semiconductor chip fabrication processes and facilities, potentially allowing for more straightforward manufacturing scale-up than some competing quantum computing hardware approaches that require novel, specialized manufacturing techniques.
PsiQuantum has pursued an unusually singular focus on building a genuinely fault-tolerant quantum computer, meaning a machine capable of reliably correcting the quantum errors that inevitably occur during quantum computation at a scale sufficient to run computationally meaningful, commercially valuable quantum algorithms, rather than pursuing smaller-scale, less error-corrected quantum systems that some competing quantum computing companies have brought to market earlier in their respective development timelines despite more limited practical computational capability. The company has partnered with GlobalFoundries, a major semiconductor manufacturing company, to fabricate its photonic quantum computing chips using existing chip manufacturing infrastructure, and has secured government support including funding from the Australian government for a planned quantum computing facility in Brisbane, alongside a facility planned in Chicago. PsiQuantum has raised very substantial venture funding from investors including BlackRock and Temasek-affiliated funds, reaching a valuation exceeding $6 billion, competing with other quantum computing hardware approaches pursued by Google, IBM, and IonQ.
