NTT and Mitsubishi Electric back optical quantum computing startup

OptQC, a September 2024 spin-out from the University of Tokyo’s renowned Furusawa Laboratory working on optical quantum computing hardware, has raised ￥7 billion (approximately $45 million) in venture finance from some of Japan’s biggest tech firms.

Led by telecommunications giant NTT, the round was supported by 21 companies in total, among them Mitsubishi Electric’s innovation fund, Shimadzu, Canon, and Kyocera.

Including research grants, it brings cumulative funding of the startup to more than ￥20 billion, and OptQC says it will use the proceeds to fund next-generation processor development and hiring.

News of the support comes a couple of months after the startup announced that its first commercial demonstration system was up and running. That system features around 100 qubits, but the plan is to extend that computational performance by a factor of one hundred by next year, and to one million qubits by the end of the decade.

No cryogenics

Critically, OptQC's photonic architecture is said to operate at room temperature and atmospheric pressure, thus eliminating the need for cryogenic chilling, and liquid helium.

The firm says its approach opens the path to deployments inside conventional data centers and optical networks, and its collaboration with NTT aims to realize a one-million-qubit-class, fault-tolerant optical quantum computer by 2030.

As the startup company points out, quantum computers can be built on several different physical platforms, most of which require some kind of optical hardware - for example precise laser wavelengths needed to excite atoms or ions into elevated energy states.

However, photonic quantum computing architectures are seen by their proponents as the most credible route to combining large-scale deployment with practical, real-world use, for three key reasons.

According to OptQC the first is that optical systems operate at room temperature and atmospheric pressure, substantially reducing the energy consumption and system complexity associated with approaches that require cryogenic environments.

In addition, the optical approach supports clock speeds of hundreds of terahertz, and is also directly compatible with the optical communications infrastructure already deployed worldwide in data centers and long-distance communications networks.

Commenting on the latest fundraising effort, OptQC’s CEO Kan Takase said: “I am deeply honored that, in addition to the venture capital firms that have supported us since our seed round, we have now been joined by leading companies across a wide range of industries - telecommunications, electronics, aerospace, precision instruments, finance and real estate.

“Our collaboration with NTT, in particular, has deepened on both the technology and business fronts since last year, and having NTT join us as lead investor gives us significant momentum.

“We will invest this capital in securing talent and in developing our next-generation processor, following our first-generation machine, ‘MoQuren’, announced recently, to further advance the real-world application of optical quantum computing.”

Million-qubit roadmap

The NTT collaboration envisages building a 10,000-qubit-class optical quantum computer as soon as next year, with system verification pencilled in for 2028.

In 2029, they will aim to develop a software platform for the integrated use of optical quantum computers and classical computers, with a one-million-qubit-class system to follow a year later thanks to the adoption of wavelength division multiplexing.

NTT’s CEO Akira Shimada commented: “Building on the expertise NTT has cultivated in optical communications technologies, networks, and data centers, we will work with OptQC through this capital and business alliance and joint research to advance optical quantum computers in an integrated manner, from research and development to commercialization and further to real-world implementation.

“Through this initiative, we aim to bring optical quantum computing technologies originating in Japan to the global stage and contribute to the creation of new value.”

In a separate announcement, Mitsubishi Electric’s VP of business innovation Komi Matsubara added: “OptQC is a startup with advanced technological capabilities in developing optical quantum computer hardware and significant potential for practical applications.

“Through this investment, we will apply their technological and market insights to our quantum-related technologies and efforts to explore applications across industrial fields. Our goal is to create meaningful new value and promising business opportunities in quantum computing.”