Image credits: IQM Quantum Computers
Espoo-based IQM Quantum Computers, a quantum computing company, announced on Friday that it has raised €128M in a Series A2 round of funding led by World Fund.
Bayern Kapital, EIC Fund, OurCrowd, QCI SPV, Tofino, and Varma participated in the round. Existing investors Maki.vc, Matadero QED, MIG Fonds, OpenOcean, Salvia GmbH, Santo Venture Capital GmbH, Tencent, Tesi, and Vsquared, also participated.
The announcement comes two months after the company received a €35M grant from the European Investment Bank (EIB). In 2020, the Finnish company raised €39M in a Series A1 funding led by MIG Fonds.
Fund utilisation
The company says it will use the funds to co-design quantum computer processors to tackle the climate crisis and promote sustainable development to improve lives.
Dr. Jan Goetz, CEO and co-founder of IQM Quantum Computers, says, “This funding underscores the importance of our mission: building quantum computers for the well-being of humankind. It also demonstrates the confidence in our business model and the continued trust in our team’s ability to build the future of quantum technologies. I am confident that we will continue to achieve all our product and business milestones and deliver world-class quantum computers to our customers.”
IQM Quantum Computers: What you need to know
Founded in 2018 by Jan Goetz, Juha Vartiainen, Kuan Yen Tan, and Mikko Mottonen, IQM builds scalable hardware for universal quantum computers, focusing on superconducting technology.
A spinoff of Aalto University and VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, IQM’s core technology builds upon decades of research from the world-renowned Quantum Computing and Devices (QCD) lab. This know-how is combined with the experience of quantum computing experts from Bilbao, Munich, Zurich, Delft, and several other locations.
At present, it is the only European company to deliver full-stack quantum systems.
A report from BCG reveals that Quantum computing could create up to $850B in value globally over the next 15-30 years as it scales up and improves accuracy and stability. The technology is expected to improve drug discovery, transform encryption and data protection, and predict financial systems, adds the report.
IQM’s mission is to use its technology for the well-being of humankind and to tackle the climate crisis. The technology could also enable innovation in energy grid optimisation and climate modelling.
Dr. Jan Goetz says, “This funding underscores the importance of our mission: building quantum computers for the well-being of humankind. It also demonstrates the confidence in our business model and the continued trust in our team’s ability to build the future of quantum technologies. I am confident that we will continue to achieve all our product and business milestones and deliver world-class quantum computers to our customers.”
IQM says it is exploring novel approaches to develop better battery solutions with a leading car manufacturer, as well as ground-breaking methods for new material design and quantum algorithms that can be used to tackle climate problems.
IQM is also building Finland’s first commercial 54-qubit quantum computer with VTT, and an IQM-led consortium (Q-Exa) is building a quantum computer in Germany. The computer will be integrated into an HPC supercomputer to create an accelerator for future scientific research.
IQM has over 160 employees with offices in Paris, Bilbao, Munich, and Espoo.
Investor
World Fund is a European-focused climate venture capital fund. The company invests in European climate tech with a climate performance potential (CPP) of at least 100Mt CO2e emission savings per year.
Daria Saharova, Founding Partner at World Fund, says, “Quantum computing holds the potential to drive the breakthroughs needed to help solve the climate crisis. We are proud to lead this round and support IQM’s ambition to deliver quantum advantage to climate and sustainability goals. This investment aligns with our commitment to back only companies with the highest climate performance potential (CPP) so that our portfolio can save two gigatonnes of emissions yearly by 2040 – the equivalent to four percent of all global emissions. It gives us immense pleasure to support the amazing IQM team and its founders, who have meticulously and consistently built IQM with a strong on-premises business model focused on high-performance computing centres and national quantum labs. We look forward to being a part of their growth phase towards global leadership.”
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