Insider Brief
- Oratomic launched with research suggesting utility-scale quantum computers could be built with far fewer qubits than previously estimated, accelerating timelines for practical applications.
- The company reports that fault-tolerant quantum systems using roughly 10,000 reconfigurable atomic qubits could perform tasks including running Shor’s algorithm, challenging current encryption methods.
- The findings highlight both the potential of neutral-atom platforms to scale rapidly and the growing urgency to transition to post-quantum cryptography.
PRESS RELEASE — Oratomic, a startup founded by pioneers of fault-tolerant quantum computing and neutral-atom technology, launches with a mission to build utility-scale quantum computers by the end of the decade.
Groundbreaking research from Oratomic in collaboration with scientists at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) shows that utility-scale quantum computers may require far fewer resources than previously believed, significantly accelerating the timeline for useful quantum computing. Such quantum computers have broad-ranging applications from quantum simulation to artificial intelligence. Importantly, these computers would also be capable of running Shor’s algorithm, which can solve cryptographic problems underlying widely deployed modern encryption. This research shows that such a capability may be achieved sooner than expected.
Oratomic’s initial team includes Dolev Bluvstein, Madelyn Cain, Jackson Ellis, Manuel Endres, Simon Evered, Andrei Faraon, Hsin-Yuang Huang (Robert), Robbie King, Harry Levine, Hannah Manetsch, Lewis Picard, Nickolas Pilgram, John Preskill, and Qian Xu, coming from Caltech, Berkeley, Harvard, Amazon, Google, and other institutions. While researchers such as John Preskill have been working on fault-tolerant quantum computing for decades, and Manuel Endres working on neutral-atom tweezer systems for over a decade, the researchers believe this breakthrough sparks the moment to launch a company.
“Oratomic’s founding team all previously believed that commercially useful quantum computing was far away,” said Dolev Bluvstein, Oratomic’s CEO. “Our new research advances simultaneously changed all of our minds. We have assembled a team of top experts across neutral-atom quantum computing, error-correction theory, artificial intelligence, and optical engineering, and we are on a focused mission to build a utility-scale quantum computer.”
The new research demonstrates that utility-scale fault-tolerant quantum computers can be built with 10,000 reconfigurable atomic qubits, dramatically lowering the hardware threshold required for cryptographically relevant quantum computation, relative to previous estimates of millions of qubits. At the same time, neutral atoms are enabling faster scaling to large qubit numbers than any other quantum computing platform—Oratomic co-founder Manuel Endres has already trapped arrays of 6,000 atomic qubits.
The research builds on a new approach to quantum computer design using reconfigurable arrays of atomic qubits, where atoms can be dynamically rearranged during computation to enable more flexible connectivity and more efficient quantum error correction.
Global guidelines are to transition to post-quantum encryption by 2035.
“It is plausible, although not guaranteed, that we will have a fault-tolerant quantum computer by the end of the decade,” said Bluvstein. “Although exciting and opening the door to a broad range of applications, such advances would also put modern cryptography at risk. Our results emphasize the importance of transitioning vulnerable cryptosystems to post-quantum encryption.”
The work highlights the growing potential of neutral-atom quantum computers to enable breakthroughs across fields including materials science, chemistry, physics, and artificial intelligence. Oratomic’s goal is to enable these breakthroughs through rapid development of utility-scale quantum computing systems.
To read the paper, please visit: https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.28627
