U.S. Department of Commerce Announces Letters of Intent With 9 Companies For $2 Billion 

Insider Brief

• The U.S. Department of Commerce signed nine letters of intent totaling $2.013 billion in proposed CHIPS Act incentives to support quantum foundries and quantum computing companies developing utility-scale, fault-tolerant quantum systems.
• IBM and GlobalFoundries are set to receive planned funding to expand domestic quantum manufacturing infrastructure, including superconducting wafer fabrication and secure multi-modality quantum foundry capabilities.
• The proposed incentives span multiple quantum computing approaches, with companies including Atom Computing, Diraq, D-Wave, Infleqtion, PsiQuantum, Quantinuum, and Rigetti Computing receiving planned support for challenges such as error correction, cryogenic integration, photonic packaging, and large-scale qubit control.

PRESS RELEASE — The Department of Commerce today announced the signing of 9 letters of intent to provide $2.013 billion in federal incentives under the CHIPS and Science Act.

These funds will support a portfolio of quantum companies, including two domestic quantum foundry companies and 7 quantum computing companies to accelerate solving the most critical technology challenges in the race to develop utility scale, fault-tolerant quantum computers.

The Department of Commerce’s quantum incentives are designed to strengthen America’s position in this critical frontier technology. Quantum computing has significant implications for national defense, advanced materials and biopharmaceutical discovery, financial modeling, and energy systems. A strong domestic quantum ecosystem is essential for U.S. national security, technological resilience and long-term strategic leadership.

These letters of intent demonstrate the Trump Administration’s commitment to strengthening American leadership in emerging technologies by investing directly in advanced manufacturing, research, and microelectronics innovation.

“With today’s CHIPS Research and Development investments in quantum computing, the Trump administration is leading the world into a new era of American innovation,” said Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick. “These strategic quantum technology investments will build on our domestic industry, creating thousands of high-paying American jobs while advancing American quantum capabilities.”

Foundry Incentives to Accelerate Domestic Quantum Manufacturing Infrastructure

The Department of Commerce is proposing to provide incentives for two quantum foundries (GlobalFoundries and IBM) to help establish and accelerate foundational domestic manufacturing capacity for the quantum sector.

• GlobalFoundries will receive $375 million in planned funding to establish a secure, domestic quantum foundry for leading architectures and multiple modalities (superconducting, trapped ion, photonic, topological, and silicon spin) used in large-scale quantum computers.
• IBM will receive $1 billion in planned funding to establish a new quantum foundry subsidiary for quantum-grade superconducting wafers by building on its U.S. leadership in superconducting quantum wafer fabrication technology.

Quantum portfolio spans multiple modalities and addresses discrete technology challenges

The structure of the Department of Commerce’s proposed incentives is intended to provide capital toward an initial portfolio of 7 companies that will address the most consequential, unresolved engineering problems in multiple quantum modalities.

“The CHIPS R&D Office is taking a portfolio approach to strengthen and accelerate U.S. leadership across multiple quantum modalities at once, while focusing each award on discrete technological problems of genuine consequence,” said Bill Frauenhofer, Executive Director of Semiconductor Investment and Innovation. “We will be providing incentives to build domestic quantum capacity, solve the hardest engineering challenges, enable multi-year acceleration of technology roadmaps, and drive continued U.S. quantum leadership.”

The companies listed below receiving CHIPS incentives will address multiple modalities including neutral atom, silicon-spin, superconducting, photonic, and trapped ion and accelerate R&D for the most consequential unresolved engineering problems including device reproducibility, optical complexity, error rates, cryogenic systems integration, control hardware, ultra-fast readout electronics, photonic loss, and interconnects.

• Atom Computing will receive $100 million in planned funding to address key technical and manufacturing challenges for neutral-atom quantum computing, including hardware development and systems integration needed to manipulate, control, and address tens of thousands of qubits, and validate their performance.
• Diraq will receive up to $38 million in planned funding to develop and scale quantum logic units and accelerate critical manufacturing and integration capabilities for silicon spin quantum computing technologies, including novel designs for large-scale and reliable qubit arrays.
• D-Wave will receive $100 million in planned funding for critical advancements in annealing and gate-model superconducting quantum computing systems, including qubit counts, error rates, and coherence through advanced dielectric material optimization, interface control, and high-density advanced packaging.
• Infleqtion will receive $100 million in planned funding to develop the underlying engineering systems and integration requirements for large-scale neutral-atom-based quantum computers and architectures, including high-powered optical systems, novel readout and error correction systems.
• PsiQuantum will receive $100 million in planned funding to address key photonic quantum computing technical challenges for matured and high-performance electro-optic materials, high-temperature single-photon detectors, and ultra-low-loss photonic packaging.
• Quantinuum will receive $100 million in planned funding to address critical technology and manufacturing bottlenecks for scaling of fault-tolerant trapped-ion-based quantum computers, such as low-loss integrated photonics, and reliable optical components at trapped-ion critical wavelengths.
• Rigetti will receive up to $100 million in planned funding to address key technical challenges to develop and scale next generation superconducting quantum computing technologies and architectures, such as miniaturizing and integrating novel readout electronics and next generation cryostat architectures.

The Department will receive a minority, non-controlling equity stake in each company as a condition for receiving the funds to enhance the return for the U.S. taxpayer.

The CHIPS Research and Development Office continues to solicit proposals from eligible applicants for research, prototyping and commercial solutions that advance microelectronics technology in the U.S. Eligible applicants should apply under announcement 2025-NIST-CHIPS-CRDO-01 at www.grants.gov.