U.S. to Award Quantum Computing Firms $2 Billion and Take Equity Stakes, WSJ Reports

The Trump administration is awarding $2 billion in grants to nine quantum-computing companies in deals that include U.S. government equity stakes, the Commerce Department said, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The move accelerates the administration's plans to boost the nascent industry, which has attracted a wave of investment from investors and businesses in recent months.

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. Coupled with advances in artificial intelligence, quantum computing has the potential to turbocharge scientific research, making it an economic and national security priority for President Trump.

IBM and other companies are working to develop specialized chips for quantum computing, a focus for the government in its bid to spur domestic supply chains. 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 Quantum Computing, Rigetti Computing and Infleqtion.