Atom Computing, a start-up based in Berkeley, California, announced $15 million in Series A funding for its first-generation quantum computing system.
Atom Computing is building nuclear-spin qubits out of an alkaline earth element. The company's first-generation quantum computing system, Phoenix, is currently capable of trapping 100 atoms in a vacuum chamber with optical tweezers. Phoenix is able to rearrange and manipulate their quantum states with lasers. The company said its design demonstrates exceptionally stable qubits at scale, with coherence times that are orders of magnitude greater than ever reported.
Atom Computing also announced the appointment of Rob Hays as CEO, President and member of Atom Computing's Board of Directors. Hays was most recently Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer for Lenovo's Infrastructure Solutions Group. He also served at Intel for more than 20 years, where he was Vice President and General Manager responsible for leading Intel's Xeon processor roadmaps. Company co-founder and CTO, Ben Bloom, Ph.D., will continue leading Atom Computing's engineering team.
"Quantum computing has accelerated to a point where it is no longer 10 years out. The scalability and stability of our systems gives us confidence that we will be able to lead the industry to true quantum advantage," said Rob Hays, CEO and President, Atom Computing. "We will be able to solve complex problems that have not been practical to address with classical computing, even with the exponential performance gains of Moore's Law and massively-scalable cluster architectures."
The funding round includes investment from Venrock, Innovation Endeavors and Prelude Ventures. In addition, the National Science Foundation awarded the company three grants.
"Atom Computing has a deep focus on scalable platforms compatible with error correction," said Ben Bloom, Co-founder and CTO, Atom Computing. "We've been able to focus on building a one-of-a-kind system that exists nowhere else in the world. Even within the first few months of Phoenix's operation, we have measured performance levels never before reported in any scalable quantum system."
https://www.atom-computing.com/
