Robert Bosch Venture Capital invests in Quantum Computing Startup IonQ
STUTTGART, Germany, Nov. 5, 2019 – Robert Bosch Venture Capital GmbH (RBVC), the corporate venture capital company of the Bosch Group, has participated in an extension of the recent funding of IonQ, which comprises a sum of over 55 million US dollars. The US-based start-up develops and commercializes Quantum Computers. “We are excited to work with one of the most renowned teams in Quantum Computing,” says RBVC Managing Director Dr. Ingo Ramesohl. “Commercially useable Quantum Computers could disrupt the way we develop products at Bosch.” IonQ plans on making its computers commercially available via the cloud and developing next-generation systems for programming these machines.
The Quantum Computing Race
In comparison to digital High Performance Computing, Quantum Computers could exponentially speed up solving e.g. hard optimization problems — from helping identify the best delivery routes for shipping companies to helping hardware designers produce more energy-efficient materials and batteries.
IonQ’s trapped-ion approach offers the most promise for making reliable, scalable quantum computing a reality. Recently, the company built the largest programmable quantum computer to date, demonstrating performance benchmarks that no other quantum computer has been able to match.
Excellent Team and Investors
In addition to the founding scientific heavy-weights Chris Monroe and Jungsang Kim, IonQ attracted excellent engineering and commercial talent around CEO Peter Chapman. “This investment round marks a key milestone in our effort to make quantum computing commercially viable,” says Peter Chapman. “RBVC is a great addition to our investor base. Big industrial groups like Bosch are front-runners in real life applications for quantum computers.” The early backers New Enterprise Associates (NEA), GV and Amazon are now joined by a broad consortium of financial and industrial investors like Mubadala Capital, Samsung Catalyst Fund and RBVC.
About RBVC GmbH
Robert Bosch Venture Capital GmbH (RBVC) is the corporate venture capital company of the Bosch Group, a leading global supplier of technology and services. RBVC invests worldwide in innovative start-up companies at all stages of their development. Its investment activities focus on technology companies working in areas of business of current and future relevance for Bosch, above all, automation and electrification, energy efficiency, enabling technologies, and healthcare systems. RBVC also invests in services and business models as well as new materials that are relevant to the above-mentioned areas of business.
About IonQ
After decades of research, IonQ was founded in 2015 with a license to core technology from the University of Maryland and Duke University, and the goal of taking trapped ion quantum computing out of the lab and into the market. IonQ is headquartered in College Part, MD and has raised approximately $22m in funding to date. The company currently has 39 employees and operates three own Quantum Computers.
Source: RBVC GmbH
