PsiQuantum Wins $125 Million DARPA Deal to Benchmark Photonic Quantum Hardware
On July 22, 2026, PsiQuantum signed a $125 million DARPA Quantum Benchmarking Initiative agreement—its largest U.S. government award—to test whether industrially useful quantum computing is achievable by 2033.
What happened
Photonic quantum computing startup PsiQuantum signed a $125 million agreement with the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency on July 22, 2026, according to Reuters reporting. The award falls under DARPA’s Quantum Benchmarking Initiative (QBI), which aims to determine whether an industrially useful quantum computer can be built by 2033.
The company called it its largest U.S. government award to date. It follows a prior $31.8 million DARPA agreement from September 2025 and will fund testing of PsiQuantum’s hardware and software stack.
Why PsiQuantum’s approach is different
Founded in 2016, PsiQuantum builds toward fault-tolerant machines using photonics—silicon photonics chips manufactured at GlobalFoundries in New York—rather than superconducting or trapped-ion qubits alone. The firm raised $1 billion at a $7 billion valuation in 2025, with BlackRock, Temasek, Baillie Gifford, and Nvidia’s venture arm among participants.
Broader U.S. quantum industrial policy
The DARPA deal lands amid deeper federal entanglement with quantum firms, including Commerce Department discussions of CHIPS Act equity-linked support. For PsiQuantum, QBI is both a technical proving ground and a geopolitical signal: Washington wants credible, benchmarked paths to utility-scale quantum—not just qubit count press releases.
Key takeaways
- The $125 million QBI agreement funds hardware and software evaluation against a 2033 utility-scale horizon.
- It is PsiQuantum’s largest U.S. government award reported to date, layered on a $31.8 million DARPA deal from 2025.
- Reuters reporting situates the award in a broader U.S. push for industrially useful, benchmarked quantum systems.