Seven quantum hardware companies have been awarded multimillion-pound contracts to build a diverse range of quantum computing testbeds at the NQCC facilities in Oxfordshire by March 2025.
The £30m programme has been funded through the UKRI Technology Missions Fund and the UK’s National Quantum Computing Centre (NQCC). The funding competition is delivered by Innovate UK, part of UKRI. The seven winners will develop and deliver quantum computing testbeds that will represent cutting-edge quantum computing solutions, implemented in a range of technology platforms.
The winning companies are:
- Aegiq, Sheffield
- Cold Quanta UK, Warwick
- ORCA Computing, London
- Oxford Ionics, Oxford
- Quantum Motion, London
- QuEra Computing, Exeter
- Rigetti UK, London
In establishing these quantum testbeds, the NQCC is aiming to showcase, demonstrate, and evaluate the capabilities of different hardware solutions.
The successful innovators will undertake development, build, and commissioning activities, to deploy operationally ready quantum computing testbeds at the NQCC.
The seven projects reflect the range of qubit architectures that could offer a pathway to fault-tolerant quantum computing. Rigetti, for example, will build a testbed with 24 superconducting qubits, while Oxford Ionics will demonstrate a trapped-ion platform based on technology originally developed at the University of Oxford. Two of the projects, awarded to QuEra and Infleqtion (formerly ColdQuanta), will assemble hardware systems based on neutral atoms, while ORCA Computing and Aegiq will take different approaches to photonics-based quantum computing. The seventh project, meanwhile, will see Quantum Motion create a demonstration platform that exploits spin qubits within a silicon-chip architecture.
Read a press release by the Department of Science, Innovation & Technology (DSIT) here.