Overview
- The Commerce Department announced Thursday that it has issued letters of intent to allocate $2 billion across nine quantum companies and to receive minority equity stakes in each firm.
- IBM is the largest recipient with a $1 billion LOI to build a standalone quantum chip foundry called Anderon and has pledged to match the federal grant with $1 billion of its own funds.
- D‑Wave confirmed that its reported $100 million award would be structured as an equity issuance to the Commerce Department while other companies have said their LOIs follow similar ownership arrangements.
- The agreements remain letters of intent that must be finalized and are contingent on milestone reviews before any funds change hands.
- Markets reacted immediately with sharp premarket gains for recipients and peers, the funding comes from the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act, and the move follows the administration’s recent pattern of pairing federal capital with ownership in strategic firms.