U.S. Gets Minority Stakes in D-Wave, Rigetti, Quantinuum in $300 Million CHIPS Act Funding Deal

The U.S. Department of Commerce has announced $2.01 billion in federal incentives for nine quantum computing companies under the CHIPS and Science Act. This funding is part of a broader strategy by the Trump administration to boost the nascent quantum industry and maintain a competitive edge against countries like China. Companies receiving these grants include IBM, GlobalFoundries, Atom Computing, Diraq, D-Wave, Infleqtion, PsiQuantum, Quantinuum, and Rigetti.

IBM will receive the largest allocation at $1 billion to establish a new quantum foundry subsidiary named Anderon for superconducting wafers, with IBM also investing $1 billion of its own capital. GlobalFoundries is set to receive $375 million to create a secure, domestic quantum foundry for various architectures and modalities. The remaining seven companies—Atom Computing, Diraq, D-Wave, Infleqtion, PsiQuantum, Quantinuum, and Rigetti—will collectively receive approximately $638 million. Specifically, Atom Computing, D-Wave, Infleqtion, PsiQuantum, and Quantinuum will each get $100 million, while Rigetti will receive up to $100 million and Diraq up to $38 million.

In return for the funding, the Department of Commerce will receive a minority, non-controlling equity stake in each of the seven quantum hardware companies. This approach of taking equity stakes in companies receiving government funding is not new; the government previously took a 10% equity stake in Intel as part of its $8.9 billion investment, though without board seats or governance rights. Investment banking firm Jefferies noted that this strategy is increasingly used as a tool of industrial policy, spanning nearly 20 companies across semiconductors, critical minerals, and defense, especially given the U.S.-China tech rivalry.

Analysts like Brandon Sun of Cohen Capital Markets suggest that government co-investment could increase institutional investor confidence in evaluating these quantum companies, despite the inherent technological and commercialization risks. Following the announcements, shares of D-Wave, Rigetti, and Infleqtion all saw significant jumps, with IBM also rising. D-Wave, for instance, plans to use its $100 million to accelerate the development and scaling of its annealing and gate-model quantum systems, including a 100,000-qubit annealing system and a 10,000-qubit gate-model system.