Inside the $1 Billion Quantum Computer That Could Change the World
Quantum computing has burned through billions of dollars with little to show for it – until possibly now. PsiQuantum has raised more than $1 billion to build the world's first million-qubit quantum computer, and they're betting everything on technology approaches shunned by others.
While IBM, Google, and Microsoft chase hundreds of qubits using exotic "chandelier" machines that require near-absolute zero temperatures, PsiQuantum took a radically different approach: building quantum computers out of light itself. Their photonic qubits don't need the extreme cooling that other quantum systems require, and they're promising to leap from today's small-scale demonstrations straight to a million qubits by 2027. It's either the most brilliant gamble in tech history or one of the most expensive failures waiting to happen.
This episode takes you inside PsiQuantum's secretive Silicon Valley facilities, where they're manufacturing custom chips that manipulate individual photons and building massive cryogenic plants borrowed from particle accelerators. We explore their custom optical switches made from barium titanate – a material so exotic that they had to invent new manufacturing processes just to create it. From molecular beam epitaxy machines to quantum networking infrastructure, this is the most ambitious hardware project you've never heard of.
The stakes couldn't be higher. If PsiQuantum succeeds, they could revolutionize drug discovery, materials science, and cryptography overnight. If they fail, it will be one of the most spectacular crashes in venture capital history. Either way, their story reveals why quantum computing remains both the most promising and most frustrating frontier in technology – and why understanding it might be impossible for anyone who isn't building the machines themselves.
Subscribe to watch more Core Memory videos https://www.youtube.com/@CoreMemoryVideos/videos
Check out our podcasts https://www.youtube.com/@CoreMemoryVideos/podcasts https://www.corememory.com/podcast
Find Ashlee Vance at www.corememory.com https://www.instagram.com/ashlee.vance/ https://x.com/ashleevance
Quantum computing has burned through billions of dollars with little to show for it – until possibly now. PsiQuantum has raised more than $1 billion to build the world's first million-qubit quantum computer, and they're betting everything on technology approaches shunned by others.
While IBM, Google, and Microsoft chase hundreds of qubits using exotic "chandelier" machines that require near-absolute zero temperatures, PsiQuantum took a radically different approach: building quantum computers out of light itself. Their photonic qubits don't need the extreme cooling that other quantum systems require, and they're promising to leap from today's small-scale demonstrations straight to a million qubits by 2027. It's either the most brilliant gamble in tech history or one of the most expensive failures waiting to happen.
This episode takes you inside PsiQuantum's secretive Silicon Valley facilities, where they're manufacturing custom chips that manipulate individual photons and building massive cryogenic plants borrowed from particle accelerators. We explore their custom optical switches made from barium titanate – a material so exotic that they had to invent new manufacturing processes just to create it. From molecular beam epitaxy machines to quantum networking infrastructure, this is the most ambitious hardware project you've never heard of.
The stakes couldn't be higher. If PsiQuantum succeeds, they could revolutionize drug discovery, materials science, and cryptography overnight. If they fail, it will be one of the most spectacular crashes in venture capital history. Either way, their story reveals why quantum computing remains both the most promising and most frustrating frontier in technology – and why understanding it might be impossible for anyone who isn't building the machines themselves.
Subscribe to watch more Core Memory videos https://www.youtube.com/@CoreMemoryVideos/videos
Check out our podcasts https://www.youtube.com/@CoreMemoryVideos/podcasts https://www.corememory.com/podcast
Find Ashlee Vance at www.corememory.com https://www.instagram.com/ashlee.vance/ https://x.com/ashleevance