Critics are concerned that PsiQuantum will not prioritise quantum computing in Australia. Photo: Shutterstock
Quantum computing pioneer PsiQuantum has moved to allay concerns that a major new contract to build the largest quantum computer in the United States would divert resources from a similar Brisbane system in which Australia controversially invested nearly $1 billion.
The new Quantum Computing Operations Centre (QCOC) will be located at a former steel mill on Chicago’s south side in partnership with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), and will be funded by US$760 million ($500 million) from the state of Illinois, Cook County and the city of Chicago, as well as US$427 million ($280 million) from DARPA.
It will be the largest quantum computing facility in the United States, and the planned campus is expected to house fault-tolerant quantum computers with up to 1 million qubits — a fundamental measure of quantum computing power — within the next decade.
This is comparable to the 1 million qubit system that Google is developing. But PsiQuantum’s innovative approach to successfully constructing qubits from heat-resistant photons has accelerated the company’s mission to build “the world’s first practical quantum computer” and helped it secure $940 million in equity investment, loans and grants from the Australian government in a controversial bidding process.
The secret tender, under the support of the government’s Australian Made Future Advanced Manufacturing plan, will see PsiQuantum’s first utility-scale quantum computer built in Brisbane, but the tender process has drawn scrutiny from the Australian Audit Office and alienated Australian quantum innovators, with critics saying foreign companies were given preferential treatment over Australian innovators despite their proven expertise in quantum computing research and commercialization.
Are we spreading PsiQuantum too widely?
While bits in a classical computer represent one of two states (on or off), qubits can exist in many states simultaneously, which makes quantum computers powerful, and they exploit quantum properties such as entanglement of pairs of qubits over distance.
Some critics question whether PsiQuantum can successfully do the same thing.
US-based PsyQuantum’s announcement that it will simultaneously build a second quantum computer in Chicago “casts a very dark shadow” over the investment and turns the Brisbane project into a “sideshow”, shadow science and arts minister Paul Fletcher warned, saying the new contract raises “obvious questions about where the company’s real focus and energy is”.
Rendering of PsiQuantum’s Chicago location. Image: PsiQuantum / Courtesy
Fletcher said Psiquantum would inevitably use the intellectual property rights it gained from the Brisbane project for the Chicago project, and that despite paying Psiquantum nearly $1 billion, the Australian government appears to have failed to secure exclusivity for any intellectual property developed in Australia.
Psyquontum has refuted those concerns, insisting its “Australian operations and plans remain unchanged” and that construction in Brisbane is scheduled to begin in 2025 with operations in 2027, a year earlier than the Chicago site.
“Building and deploying these systems between strong allies is paramount to maximizing the impact of quantum computing,” said Professor Jeremy O’Brien, the Australian-born CEO and co-founder of PsyQuantum, positioning the projects as complementary efforts to help geopolitical allies build a “common computing environment.”
Rendering of PsiQuantum’s Brisbane location. Image: PsiQuantum / Courtesy
Leap together
For all its promise, PsiQuantum’s latest deal will shift the centre of gravity of the quantum computing industry across the Pacific – which CSIRO predicts could be worth $6 billion and create 19,400 jobs by 2040 – and the Australian government has long wanted to keep it domestic.
However, the move carries the risk of a “brain drain” and reallocation of financial resources, with Australia’s quantum industry losing ground to better-funded American ventures, and with much of the government’s quantum funding going to this project, the knock-on effects for other local quantum innovators could be significant.
The move comes shortly after Microsoft recently decided to end a seven-year quantum computing partnership with the University of Sydney and instead refocus on the United States for what it called “organizational and workforce alignment.”