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PsiQuantum partners with GlobalFoundries ( GFS ) for chip

production

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Omega chips achieve standard semiconductor manufacturing

yields

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PsiQuantum targets commercial quantum computer by 2027

By Max A. Cherney and Stephen Nellis

SAN FRANCISCO, Feb 26 (Reuters) - PsiQuantum said on

Wednesday it had cracked one of the crucial challenges in

quantum computing: a method to manufacture quantum chips at the

volumes needed to build commercially viable machines.

Quantum technology has the potential to perform types of

calculations that would stump even the most powerful artificial

intelligence systems that use Nvidia ( NVDA ) chips and could

unlock a host of scientific and commercial applications,

including cybersecurity. The technology may help in drug

discovery and in materials research.

But mass manufacturing of quantum computing chips has been a

difficult problem to solve. Seeking a solution, PsiQuantum's

founders decided almost 20 years ago to pursue an approach that

could be made using photonics, the same semiconductor

manufacturing technology widely used in the communications

industry.

The company spent ensuing years working closely with chip

factories to engineer its chipset, called Omega, which is now

ready for production, PsiQuantum Chief Executive Jeremy O'Brien

told Reuters in an interview on Tuesday.

"This isn't a breakthrough, this is actually something that

has gone out of the research lab, and that is the highest level

of maturity that you can achieve," O'Brien said, referring to

bringing a quantum chip to mass production.

The company has partnered with GlobalFoundries ( GFS ) to

fabricate the chips at the latter's Albany, New York, factory.

PsiQuantum's method uses chip industry-standard foot-wide

wafers on GlobalFoundries' ( GFS ) 45-nanometer process and has achieved

manufacturing yields that match standard semiconductors,

according to PsiQuantum's Chief Scientific Officer Pete

Shadboldt.

"We're right now making millions of them in

GlobalFoundries ( GFS )," Shadboldt said.

PsiQuantum published findings related to the

mass-manufacture of its Omega quantum chips in the scientific

journal Nature on Wednesday.

The Palo Alto, California-based company's quantum computing

technology manipulates particles of light, or photons, to

perform the quantum calculations. The light-based approach has

several advantages, such as deploying significantly less complex

mechanisms needed to cool its quantum devices, according to

O'Brien and Shadboldt.

O'Brien told Reuters in 2023 the company planned to target a

commercial quantum computer within six years. He said on Tuesday

in the interview the company expects to complete a facility with

the ability to perform commercial applications by roughly 2027.

Last week, Microsoft ( MSFT ) showcased a quantum chip that

took a different approach but said that it shows such computers

are "years not decades" away. And after a significant

breakthrough that Alphabet Inc's ( GOOG ) Google announced in

December, the search company said earlier this month commercial

applications could arrive within five years.

PsiQuantum said in 2023 it had a valuation of $3.15 billion.

(Max A. Cherney and Stephen Nellis in San Francisco; Editing by

Muralikumar Anantharaman)