To receive industry-leading AI updates and exclusive content, sign up for our daily and weekly newsletters. Learn more
Quantum Transistors, a developer of advanced quantum processors, has been awarded a grant of up to $19 million (€17.5 million) from the European Innovation Council (EIC).
Tel Aviv, Israel-based Quantum Transistors received an initial grant of $2.7 million from the EIC Accelerator, as well as $16.3 million in future equity investment through the EIC Fund.
This significant investment is the largest in the latest EIC Accelerator funding round and highlights Quantum Transistor’s commitment to making quantum computing scalable and accessible. Quantum Transistor stood out from the 68 companies selected for funding out of 969 companies that submitted full proposals.
The company plans to use the investment to scale up its research and development efforts and expand its growing team.
“This investment is more than just funding; it’s a solid validation of our vision and technology. We’re leveraging the trillions of dollars invested in the semiconductor industry over the past 40 years to build scalable quantum technology so society can ultimately benefit from its immense potential,” Quantum Transistors CEO Shmuel Bachinsky said in a statement. “We are trying to do for quantum computing what Intel’s 8086 did for classical computing: make quantum computing accessible to everyone. This funding will help us bring that same accessibility to quantum computing. We’re thrilled and grateful that the EIC is playing an active role in supporting our efforts.”
Quantum computing uses quantum bits (qubits) that can represent both 0 and 1 simultaneously, unlike classical bits which have a value of either 0 or 1. This allows quantum computers to process a nearly infinite number of possibilities at once and perform calculations that are impossible to perform on classical computers.
As a result, the chip could become an extremely powerful tool for solving complex problems in a wide variety of fields, including cryptography, cybersecurity, drug discovery, investment, weather modeling and aeronautics.
However, despite this enormous potential, and the $55 billion invested in quantum computing worldwide to date, quantum computing is not yet an accessible and practical tool. Current approaches using photons, semiconductors, and atoms all face similar challenges: they require large, energy-intensive infrastructure and are limited in the number of qubits they can provide, making them prohibitively expensive and limiting.
Quantum Transistors is addressing these challenges by developing a universal quantum processor integrated on a single chip. Native photonics is a key aspect of their approach: each qubit is connected with photonics, eliminating the noise between qubits caused by proximity. This not only increases computational power, but also enables deployment in standard data centers, significantly reducing costs and eliminating the need for large mainframes.
The EIC Accelerator supports startups and SMEs with grants of up to $2.71 million and equity investments ranging from $540,000 to more than $16.28 million, totaling approximately $445.9 million in funding. This includes grants of up to $179 million and approximately $265.8 million in equity. The EIC also offers business acceleration services, providing expertise, networks and access to investors. Since its launch in 2021, more than 12,000 startups have applied. Established under the EU’s Horizon Europe program, the EIC has a budget of $10.96 billion to support innovation from early-stage research to scale-up.
VB Daily
Stay up to date! Get the latest news every day by email
Thanks for subscribing! Check out other VB newsletters here.
An error occurred.
