Quantum computing start-up Q-CTRL today announced the opening of its U.S. headquarters in Los Angeles to serve its growing industrial and academic client base throughout the U.S.
The goal of quantum computing is to leverage the exotic properties of physics found on tiny size scales to execute computations far beyond the reach of today’s fastest computers. Q-CTRL was founded in Sydney, Australia in 2017 to help solve a key obstacle to the development of the first useful quantum computers: the prevalence of computational errors.
Even the most advanced machines being developed today can only run operations for very short periods before errors creep in and programs fail, compromising the potential of quantum computers to enable sought-after breakthroughs in science, pharmaceuticals, finance and more. Error is often noted as the Achilles heel of quantum computing hardware.
Q-CTRL helps solve this critical issue by providing ‘quantum firmware,’ a set of special low-level commands which have been demonstrated to make quantum hardware more resistant to errors from environmental ‘noise’ while enhancing computational accuracy and usefulness.
“We are extremely proud to be opening our U.S. offices in L.A., close to many of our key customers and research partners,” said Michael J. Biercuk, founder and CEO of Q-CTRL. “We are dedicated to being a global company and wish to fully support the quantum computing development efforts of companies, academic institutions, and government agencies in the U.S. which will eventually deliver tremendous benefit to the world.”
“On the heels of Google’s recent announcement of having achieved quantum supremacy, improving hardware performance will become essential as we move to the first useful systems,” Biercuk said. “Without the kinds of performance enhancements our infrastructure software provides, the relevance of this technical milestone will be lost.”
The U.S. headquarters is led by Dr. David Hover, who serves as the lead customer integration engineer for Q-CTRL’s U.S. client base. Hover holds a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Wisconsin. He previously served as an instrument scientist at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in Pasadena as well as a member of the technical staff at MIT Lincoln Laboratory in Lexington, Mass.
“I’m thrilled to be able to apply my experience building and testing real superconducting quantum computers to the toughest challenges in the field,” said Hover. “Q-CTRL’s specialization in this area and dedication to producing professionally engineered software solutions was the real attraction for me. In the short time I’ve been with the team it’s been great to see how much demand there is for Q-CTRL’s products and capabilities. I’m excited to lead efforts integrating our solutions seamlessly into customer hardware.”
Q-CTRL is currently recruiting team members for its L.A. offices across a range of quantum computing specialties, including quantum computing devices, quantum algorithms, quantum error correction, and quantum circuit compilation. The company is also seeking software engineers with experience in machine learning and artificial intelligence.
Q-CTRL recently completed a $15 million Series A round led by Australia’s largest venture capital fund, Square Peg Capital and Silicon Valley’s Sierra Ventures.
The company’s new U.S. headquarters is in downtown Los Angeles. Those interested in contacting the company should visit https://q-ctrl.com/company/#contact.
ABOUT Q-CTRL
Q-CTRL was founded in November 2017 and is a venture-capital-backed company that provides control-engineering software solutions to help customers harness the power of quantum physics in next-generation technologies.
Q-CTRL is built on Professor Michael J. Biercuk’s research leading the Quantum Control Lab at the University of Sydney, where he is a Professor of Quantum Physics and Quantum Technology.
The team’s expertise led Q-CTRL to be selected as an inaugural member of the IBM Q startup network last year. Q-CTRL is funded by SquarePeg Capital, Sierra Ventures, Sequoia Capital China, Data Collective, Horizons Ventures, and Main Sequence Ventures. In 2019 it was named one of the 10 top quantum computing startups to watch by a major tech publication.
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