US Awards $2B to Quantum Firms; IBM to Receive $1B

The U.S. Department of Commerce announced more than $2 billion in awards to domestic quantum technology companies, with IBM set to receive $1 billion to form a quantum-foundry subsidiary focused on quantum-grade superconducting wafers. The department described the funding as intended to speed U.S. quantum development, support multiple hardware approaches and strengthen domestic supply chains.

The awards are being made through the CHIPS research and development program. GlobalFoundries will receive $375 million to establish a secure domestic quantum foundry designed to support superconducting, trapped-ion, photonic, topological and silicon-spin systems. The Commerce Department will take a minority, non-controlling equity stake in each company that receives funding.

Seven additional firms will share grants ranging from about $38 million to $100 million to address specific engineering challenges across different quantum modalities. Awardees named by the CHIPS R&D Office include Atom Computing, Diraq, D-Wave, Infleqtion, PsiQuantum, Quantinuum and Rigetti. The CHIPS R&D Office described the awards as targeting discrete technical problems to increase manufacturing capacity and accelerate multi-year technology roadmaps.

Howard Lutnick, commerce secretary, framed the awards as part of a broader industrial strategy and said the investments would build domestic industry and create jobs. Bill Frauenhofer, executive director of semiconductor investment and innovation at the CHIPS R&D Office, wrote that the program uses a “portfolio approach to strengthen and accelerate U.S. leadership across multiple quantum modalities at once” and that each award focuses on “discrete technological problems of genuine consequence.”

Arvind Krishna, IBM’s chairman and CEO, commented that the company’s work in silicon wafer fabrication has been central to its progress and will be important for expanding the quantum technology supply base. Alan Baratz, D-Wave’s CEO, characterized the award as a step to scale domestic fabrication and accelerate delivery of quantum applications to customers.

Officials cited national security and economic competitiveness as motivations for the funding, noting potential applications of quantum technologies in defense systems, advanced materials discovery, drug research, financial modeling and energy systems.

The awards follow the U.K. government’s recent £2 billion commitment to quantum technologies. Research firm estimates cited by the Commerce Department project that quantum computing, communication and sensing could generate up to $97 billion in global revenue by 2035, with quantum computing revenue rising from about $4 billion in 2024 to as much as $72 billion by 2035.

The Commerce Department is also soliciting proposals for additional research, prototyping and commercial solutions that advance microelectronics and quantum technology in the U.S. Applications can be submitted under announcement 2025-NIST-CHIPS-CRDO-01 at www.grants.gov.