Quantum Motion computes new UK record with £42 million raise

Eclipsing OQC’s £38 million Series A round announced in July of last year, London-based Quantum Motion Technologies has raised £42 million in a Series B round that will support the company’s continued development of silicon quantum processors. Specifically, a portion of the funding will allow Quantum Motion to work more closely with tier one foundries during the validation process as well as grow the team size by another 50 talents by early 2024.

The recording setting round was led by Robert Bosch Venture Capital and joined by Porsche SE and British Patient Capital with all previous investors including Inkef, IP Group, NSSIF, Octopus Ventures, Oxford Sciences Enterprises, and Parkwalk Advisors renewing their support of the company. Including this round, Quantum Motion has raised £62 million.

A spin-out of UCL and Oxford University and founded in 2017, Quantum Motion is working on patented technology (silicon spin-based qubit architectures) that makes it possible to build a functional, ‘fault-tolerant’ quantum computer in a reasonable size that could be manufactured at scale.

To grasp what Quantum Motion is working on, it’s important to keep in mind that there’s no one single “right” answer to achieving quantum computing, and that leading approaches include those of (as defined by Princeton University): “superconducting qubits, qubits made from trapping ions with light, qubits made from the silicon materials found in today’s computers, qubits captured in "color centers" in high-purity diamonds, and topologically protected qubits represented in exotic subatomic particles.”

When it comes to a list of superconductor materials, you’d be right in thinking that a number of them fall under the ‘exotic’ category. Ion traps involve some incredibly accurate lasers, which thus in turn require some high-fidelity optics. And diamonds? Enough said.

As a reminder, silicon, while not quite exactly sand, but for a game of horseshoes is close enough, is primarily obtained from quartz. It can also be sourced from minerals mica and talc, all reasonably abundantly found on the crust of planet Earth.

Silicon, as in The Valley, is a proven technology in computing, uses materials and existing industrial manufacturing processes (CMOS - you’re already using something produced by this method, even if you don’t know it) found the world over and thus could be the fastest, most cost-effective and scalable way of producing the millions of qubits that are needed to create fully-functional, fault-tolerant quantum computers.

Moving things forward to Quantum Motion, on the investment company CEO James Palles-Dimmock commented, “We’ve secured the support of leading technology investors, allowing us to realise our vision of a quantum computer built using standard foundry processes. This support, along with the continuing UK national quantum programme and European initiatives, provides a step-change in our capabilities. We have assembled a world-leading team and with the funding and support in place, we are ready to scale and deliver on our vision.”