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  • 🔵 The Quantum Insider Weekly | Quantum Hot Streak Continues. Companies Primed to Go Public. And More News in Quantum.

🔵 The Quantum Insider Weekly | Quantum Hot Streak Continues. Companies Primed to Go Public. And More News in Quantum.

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FROM THE EDITOR.

One of the blessings of covering science, technology, and business is access to an abundance of acronyms. Of all the acronyms I’ve encountered, my favorite is SPAC.

It stands for “special-purpose acquisition company.” Why do I love it? First, a “special purpose” plays a key role in one of history’s cinematic masterpieces: The Jerk, starring Steve Martin. Also, as a headline writer, it offers fun rhymes like SPAC Attack or That’s the SPAC, Jack (a Bill Murray reference — I hope you’re getting a real sense of my aesthetics).

I also like that SPACs are referred to as blank-check companies because, to me, that phrase fills my mind with images of gentlemen in top hats and monocles passing out large bags stamped with a dollar-sign logo.

Despite my vivid imagination of blank checks and money-filled bags, this is not the actual SPAC process — which still requires hard work and due diligence to become a publicly traded company. Indeed, most of today’s public quantum firms have chosen this route to transition to public status.

This week, we congratulate two more quantum startups — Infleqtion and Horizon Quantum Computing — which announced they are entering into SPAC merger agreements to become public companies.

Also this week: another week, another record fundraise.

Links to those stories and deeper coverage are included in this edition.

Oh… and HAGW!

(Have a great weekend!)

— Matt, Chief Content Officer at The Quantum Insider

INSIDER BRIEF.

ANALYST NOTES.

The Noteworthy & Nuanced

Another quantum security win as Paraguay’s largest bank, Ueno Bank, implements quantum-resistant digital signatures from SignQuantum and blockchain security from QANplatform to safeguard its 2.2M customers. Supported by ITTI, the initiative secures digital operations and e-signed documents against future quantum computing threats, which could compromise traditional cryptographic systems.

IonQ’s $1B acquisition of Oxford Ionics? Approved by the UK government, but under the condition that the company’s staff, IP, and trapped-ion hardware remain in Britain. The decision, enforced under the National Security and Investment Act, reflects growing recognition of quantum computing as strategically sensitive infrastructure.

Eager to overshadow last week’s $600M raise by Quantinuum, PsiQuantum has raised $1B in Series E funding at a $7B valuation. The round, led by BlackRock with backing from Temasek, Baillie Gifford, NVentures, and others, will fund prototype deployment, chip performance gains, and expansion of Barium Titanate production. PsiQuantum’s photonic qubit approach leverages semiconductor manufacturing and scalable cooling to pursue million-qubit systems. — Alan Kanapin, Analyst at The Quantum Insider

The Research Rundown

Check out this week’s handpicked quantum research. These are studies headed for real-world impact: improving accuracy, reducing latency, using fewer resources, or solving problems that classical methods struggle with. These are early developments, but they hint at where quantum might earn its keep.

Want more research insights? Get them delivered straight to your inbox Monday, Wednesday, and Friday with The Daily Qubit. Subscribe below or use the link to update preferences at the end of this email. 👇️

➡️ Two quantum companies — Infleqtion and Horizon Quantum Computing — announced definitive agreements this week to go public through special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs).

➡️ Infleqtion, a neutral-atom hardware and sensing company, will merge with Churchill Capital Corp X at a $1.8 billion pre-money valuation, with more than $540 million in expected gross proceeds.

➡️ Horizon Quantum, a Singapore-based software developer, will merge with dMY Squared Technology Group and list as Horizon Quantum Holdings Ltd. under ticker “HQ.”

➡️ Infleqtion reported ~$29 million in trailing twelve-month revenue and a ~$300 million customer pipeline, while Horizon is positioning as a “quantum operating system” provider.

➡️ These are the first major quantum SPAC announcements since 2021, signaling renewed public-market interest after a pause.

➡️ SPACs can provide capital and visibility, but also bring risks of dilution, short-term market pressure, and investor skepticism if commercialization lags.

➡️ Together, these deals could test whether quantum companies can use public markets to accelerate scale — or whether the field is better suited to private capital until nearer-term applications mature.

Analyst Commentary

This week marks a re-emergence of SPACs in quantum. Infleqtion and Horizon Quantum announced plans to enter public markets through special purpose acquisition companies, a financing vehicle that boomed in 2020–21 but cooled amid disappointing post-merger performance for some companies. For quantum, the return of SPACs raises both opportunity and caution.

The Infleqtion Deal
Infleqtion, headquartered in Colorado and known for neutral-atom platforms, announced a combination with Churchill Capital Corp X that values the company at $1.8 billion pre-money. The transaction is expected to deliver over $540 million in gross proceeds, including $416 million from Churchill’s trust and $125 million from a PIPE financing. Infleqtion reported $29 million in trailing twelve-month revenue and highlighted customers including NVIDIA, NASA, the U.S. Department of Defense and the U.K. government. Its pipeline exceeds $300 million, spanning quantum computing, sensing, and AI applications. With three computers sold and hundreds of sensors deployed, Infleqtion is one of the first hardware firms to report commercial traction at scale.

The Horizon Deal
Horizon Quantum, founded in Singapore by Joe Fitzsimons, develops a cross-hardware software stack designed to simplify quantum programming and move toward a “quantum operating system.” Its merger with dMY Squared will rebrand the company as Horizon Quantum Holdings Ltd., with plans to list on Nasdaq. Horizon’s core product, Triple Alpha, provides an integrated development environment and runtime for hybrid quantum-classical execution. The company frames its IPO as a way to access more capital and accelerate timelines to coincide with expected advances in quantum hardware.

SPACs Explained
While SPACs are not new, a lot of people still misunderstand this financial vehicle.

A SPAC is a publicly traded shell company that raises money to acquire a private firm, offering the target company a faster path to public listing than a traditional IPO. For quantum, SPACs present an appealing route: they can deliver large pools of capital upfront, enhance global visibility, and provide liquidity to investors.

But they also carry drawbacks. Earlier quantum SPACs saw volatile trading, investor redemptions and scrutiny over commercialization timelines. Companies must contend with quarterly reporting pressure even as technology development remains long-horizon.

Implications for Quantum
Current interest in quantum is very strong — and this is another piece of evidence. The Infleqtion and Horizon announcements will be a test whether investor appetite has recovered. Infleqtion brings tangible revenue and a diversified product line, potentially making it more resilient to public-market expectations. Horizon represents the software side of the stack, appealing to investors who see long-term value in enabling layers rather than hardware alone. Together, the two highlight quantum’s breadth: one grounded in physical systems already shipping products, the other in software infrastructure designed for future hardware.

For the ecosystem, these listings could broaden access to capital beyond private venture and sovereign funding, while offering a signal of legitimacy to enterprise buyers and governments. The risk is that premature exposure to market cycles could repeat the turbulence of earlier SPACs, setting back confidence if milestones slip.

The test begins now. If Infleqtion and Horizon can translate the visibility of public markets into durable growth, they may reset the narrative around SPACs in quantum — from cautionary tale to viable pathway. If not, the lesson may be that quantum’s timeline still resists quarterly scrutiny.

DATA SPOTLIGHT.

PacketLight Networks and NEC demonstrated quantum key distribution over a 400G dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) network using a dual-fiber setup. They integrated NEC’s QKD system with PacketLight’s PL-4000M 600G Muxponder, achieving 100% data throughput and low latency, verified via a 100GbE tester. The QKD ran over a dedicated parallel fiber, maintaining quantum signal integrity. The result: a cost-effective, scalable quantum-safe model with zero performance tradeoffs on existing high-capacity infrastructure.

INDUSTRY HIGHLIGHTS.

📈 Infleqtion is going public through a $1.8 billion merger with Churchill Capital Corp X, expected to deliver over $540 million in gross proceeds backed by investors including Maverick Capital and Morgan Stanley’s Counterpoint Global.

🇲🇹 The Quantum World Tour, launched by the ITU and The Quantum Insider, began on September 9, 2025 with Malta as its first stop, highlighting how small nations can advance quantum strategies through agility and collaboration. Anchored by projects like PRISM, Europe’s first nationwide QKD network, and startups such as Merqury Cybersecurity, Malta showcased its role as a testbed and connector.

🥼 The U.S. National Science Foundation has awarded $16 million to four teams to design the first phase of the National Quantum Virtual Laboratory, which will expand nationwide access to quantum hardware and software. Projects include networked quantum computers, a quantum digital twin, and platforms based on trapped ions, photonics, and Rydberg atoms.

💸 Qubic has secured a $925,000 CAD grant from Canada’s Innovation, Science and Economic Development department and the FABrIC program to support a $2.5M project developing cryogenic amplifiers that cut heat dissipation by 10,000x. Collaborating with the University of Waterloo and the Institute for Quantum Computing, Qubic aims to commercialize the technology by 2026.

✅ The UK government has approved IonQ’s $1.075B acquisition of Oxford Ionics under the National Security and Investment Act 2021, but required that the company’s trapped-ion hardware, staff, IP, and manufacturing capacity remain in Britain.

🏛️ IonQ has launched IonQ Federal, a dedicated entity to deliver its quantum computing and networking technologies to the U.S. government and allied agencies, consolidating over $100M in federal contracts with groups like AFRL, DARPA, Oak Ridge National Labs, and ARLIS.

🤑 PsiQuantum has raised $1 billion in a Series E round led by BlackRock, with backing from Temasek, Baillie Gifford, NVIDIA’s NVentures, and others, bringing its valuation to $7 billion. The funding will support utility-scale quantum computing sites in Brisbane and Chicago.

🔗 Montana State University has deployed Qunnect’s Carina quantum networking suite to establish the Midwest’s first campus-wide entanglement network, integrating quantum computing, sensing, and networking.

💰️ QuEra Computing expanded its $230M Series B with an investment from NVentures (NVIDIA’s venture arm), deepening collaboration on hybrid quantum-classical supercomputing, AI-driven error decoding, and projects at the NVIDIA Accelerated Quantum Center.

📈 Horizon Quantum Computing will go public on Nasdaq under the ticker “HQ” through a business combination with dMY Squared Technology Group, expected to close in Q1 2026.

🇮🇳 Karnataka has approved land in Bengaluru to establish India’s first Quantum City (QCity) under its INR 1,000 crore Quantum Mission, aiming to build a $20B quantum economy by 2035. The initiative includes research labs, a hardware park, fabrication facilities, a venture fund for 100+ startups, and workforce development.

🎙️ On this week’s episode of The Quantum Economy Podcast, Anders Indset spoke with Jan Goetz, co-founder and co-CEO of IQM Quantum Computers, about scaling from a research spin-off to Europe’s first quantum unicorn. Goetz outlined IQM’s full-stack, on-premise superconducting qubit model and co-design approach aligning hardware, error correction, and applications.

EVENTS.

Sept. 16-18 -- Quantum World Congress 2025 will be held at Capital One Hall in Greater Washington. The event is a chance for the world’s quantum ecosystem to come together and bring a quantum-ready future into focus.

Sept. 24-25 -- Q2B25 Paris at Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie, Paris, France.

Sept. 29-Oct. 1 -- Quantum.Tech Europe is taking place in Rotterdam, Netherlands. The event will bring together the whole quantum supply chain to drive forward the commercial applications of Quantum Technologies.

Oct. 6-10 -- 8th International Conference for Young Quantum Information Scientists (YQIS25) will take place in Barcelona, Spain. YQIS is a conference series organized by and for PhD students and early-career researchers working across the broad field of quantum information.

Oct. 8 -- The Fifth Anniversary of The City Quantum & AI Summit will take place at the Mansion House in the City of London this year with the subtitle Race for Growth.

Oct. 8 -- The Quantum Insider, in partnership with the Business Development Board of Palm Beach County and Quantum Coast Capital, will host Quantum Beach 2025, an officially recognized event of the International Year of Quantum (IYQ2025). Register here.

Oct. 13-17 -- Quantum Reference Frames 2025 will bring together leading experts on quantum reference frames and the many related subjects in the first focused event in the new era of quantum frame covariance. QRF 2025 is co-funded by the Quantum Information Structure of Spacetime consortium.

Oct. 19-21 -- Q+AI will be held in New York City. This event will uncover the coming wave of Quantum + AI, include 50+ speakers, daily mentoring sessions and 16 sessions, one continuous track.

Nov. 10-12 -- European Quantum Technologies Conference 2025 will be held at Øksnehallen, Copenhagen, Denmark.

Dec. 1-4 -- QUEST-IS 2025 Quantum Engineering Sciences and Technologies for Industry and Services From Quantum Engineering to Applications for Citizens. EDF Lab, Paris-Saclay, France.

Dec. 17-18 -- Science Diplomacy - Bridging divides in a fragmented world will be held in Copenhagen, Denmark. The conference explores how science diplomacy can bridge divides and promote innovation, competitiveness, and international cooperation.