Quantum computing firm Xanadu announced on Friday that it is opening an advanced photonics research, development, and manufacturing hub in Toronto with financial support from the Government of Canada.
Toronto-based Xanadu has inked a definitive agreement for the feds to loan it $195 million CAD in funding—half of the up to $390 million the company has been seeking from the federal and Ontario governments as part of Project OPTIMISM—to establish and operate this facility over the next five years.
Christian Weedbrook,
“The [feds] just don’t hand out nearly $200 million to anyone in any sector. Quantum is the future, and they’re recognizing this.”
Xanadu
In an interview with BetaKit, Xanadu founder and CEO Christian Weedbrook claimed that this is the largest quantum manufacturing investment in Canadian history. It comes through Innovation, Science, and Economic Development Canada’s Strategic Response Fund, which replaced the Strategic Innovation Fund, and requires coinvestment on Xanadu’s part (the company declined to share how much exactly).
The new, 158,000-square-foot photonics hub, named Inception after the popular Christopher Nolan film, will be located in Etobicoke at the old brick Campbell’s Soup factory. Campbell’s vacated the site in 2019, and it was restored to its original Art Deco style by QuadReal Property Group. Xanadu is taking over the entire building.
Weedbrook appreciates the site’s heritage, and joked that Xanadu is considering creating company T-shirts emblazoned with the phrase “from soup to qubits.”
The CEO said this photonics hub will accelerate Xanadu’s quantum computing development efforts and build the components it needs to power future quantum data centres, the first of which it aims to establish by 2029.
Weedbrook said the investment reflects the company’s longstanding relationship with the federal government, from which it has already garnered $78 million to date. That includes $40 million from the feds through the Strategic Innovation Fund, and Xanadu is also due to land up to $23 million through the first phase of the Canadian Quantum Champions Program (CQCP).
“The [feds] just don’t hand out nearly $200 million to anyone in any sector,” Weedbrook said. “Quantum is the future, and they’re recognizing this, so it’s great to see.”
Canada’s Minister of AI and Digital Innovation Evan Solomon said in a news release that quantum “will be one of the foundational technologies of the 21st century.”
“By supporting advanced manufacturing and commercialization in Canada, we are helping ensure that Canada remains a global leader in quantum innovation and that more of the economic benefits of that leadership are created here at home,” Solomon added.
Weedbrook expressed hope that additional funding from the Ontario government would follow, but said he had no firm updates to share on the status of those discussions at this time.
RELATED: Xanadu visits the White House for quantum summit
Since 2016, TSX and Nasdaq-listed Xanadu has been working to use photonics-based quantum computing to perform exceptionally fast and complex computations at room temperature, quicker than traditional computers. Weedbrook has said that quantum computers, which have yet to prove viable at a commercially useful scale, could eventually be applied to help discover new drugs or create more powerful electric vehicle batteries.
Inception will be complementary to the $10-million advanced photonics packaging facility Xanadu opened at its Bay and College headquarters, which the company plans to maintain.
Xanadu claimed the facility will also help it develop capabilities beyond just quantum, including in packaging, heterogeneous integration, and wafer-level test infrastructure, which are also useful in telecommunications, AI hardware, and sensing technologies.
Weedbrook said Xanadu has previously outsourced most of these tasks to third-party firms in other countries. Inception will help the company execute them domestically and in-house, and move faster, he added.
RELATED: Canada launches its own quantum research program to rival DARPA initiative
He cited packaging—the process of housing, protecting, and connecting photonic quantum chips to outside components—as an example. Packaging takes Xanadu’s partner as much as three months to complete. With Inception, he said Xanadu can start doing it in eight hours, which could prove invaluable as the company races to build a large-scale quantum computer.
Weedbrook anticipates that Xanadu will begin using the facility early next year, and said the company will be growing its 320-person team to staff Inception, with hires in advanced manufacturing, engineering, and science.
Canada has a long history of losing its tech talent, research, and companies to the United States and other countries, including in AI. Weedbrook argued CQCP and Project OPTIMISM demonstrate that the Canadian government “doesn’t want to repeat past mistakes.”
“This is really the government putting their money where their mouth is,” Weedbrook said.
Feature image courtesy Josh Scott for BetaKit.