Equal1, a quantum semiconductor company, has raised $60 million to accelerate development of scalable, silicon-based quantum computers and deployment of its datacenter-ready Bell-1 quantum server.
The round was led by the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund (ISIF), with participation from Atlantic Bridge, the European Innovation Council Fund, Matterwave Ventures, Enterprise Ireland, Elkstone and TNO Ventures.
McKinsey estimates quantum computing could unlock $100 billion in value by 2035. A key barrier to capturing this value is the cost and specialised infrastructure current technologies demand. Equal1’s approach solves this.
As AI drives exponential growth in compute demand, power and cost are becoming major constraints.
Quantum computing promises to go far beyond the capabilities of even the most powerful computers today, unlocking applications from new material discovery for better drugs or batteries, next-generation grid optimization and financial portfolio optimization.
Equal1 said that at scale, quantum computing will put their current AI compute infrastructure on a more sustainable energy trajectory delivering advantage, not as a replacement, but as a tightly integrated accelerator.
Today’s quantum problem isn’t physics, but it’s production. Current quantum computers demand huge investment: custom fabrication, exotic cooling, specialist teams.
Equal1 offers a different model: quantum servers where cost, ease of deployment, power efficiency, and integration are first-order requirements.
The company develops its quantum computers using today’s silicon semiconductor industry. This unlocks semiconductor economics: costs that fall with volume, yields that improve with iteration.
Other architectures require dedicated manufacturing infrastructure. Equal1 taps what already exists.
The result is Bell-1, a rack-mounted quantum server for standard datacenter environments. No dilution refrigerators. No dedicated facilities. No team of physicists.
It arrives on wheels: roll it in, plug it in, start computing. Equal1 is already shipping, including to ESA’s Space HPC Centre in Italy.
The $60-million round, expected to expand with follow-on investors in the coming months, builds on significant technical and commercial momentum.
The funding will eploy Bell-1 into the world’s leading HPC centres; embed quantum into real workloads; advance the company roadmap towards millions of on-chip qubits; scale manufacturing through existing foundry partnerships and; grow the team to deliver production quantum at scale.
“This $60-million in funding marks the transition of Equal1 from development to deployment,” said Jason Lynch, CEO of Equal1. “As AI pushes classical computing into power and cost limits, quantum is the way forward, but only if it can be manufactured and deployed like the rest of the stack.
Lynch said that by building quantum processors on standard silicon, they’re turning quantum from bespoke hardware into deployable infrastructure — “positioning Equal1 as the quantum standard for HPC.”
Brian O’Connor, senior investment director at ISIF, said that by backing innovative Irish companies like Equal1 as they scale internationally is central to ISIF’s scaling indigenous businesses investment theme.
Gerry Maguire, board director at Equal1 and general partner at Atlantic Bridge, said this funding milestone is a significant step forward, enabling Equal1 to move from breakthrough innovation to commercialisation.
“Equal1’s approach –building on standard Complementary Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor (CMOS)-compatible semiconductor manufacturing — aligns directly with Europe’s semiconductor and quantum ambitions,” said Svetoslava Georgieva, chair of the EIC Fund Board.
Amanda Ward, head of digital technologies at Enterprise Ireland, said innovation from pioneering Irish businesses like Equal1 are gaining increasing international recognition.
