D-Wave Systems

D-Wave, a manufacturer of quantum annealers, is the world’s first commercial supplier of quantum computers, as well as a frontrunner in quantum annealing technology. The company unveiled plans to build a gate-model system in October 2021, making it the first and only quantum computing company to offer both annealing and gate-model systems. However, the company has not revealed much about its progress on the gate-based systems yet. 

D-Wave introduced the world’s first commercially available 128-qubit quantum computer using annealing technology in 2011. Over the years, the company has focused on increasing the qubits, with its latest annealer system launched in June 2022 comprising 500 qubits. It also announced plans to launch a 7,000-qubit annealer by 2023–2024. D-Wave claims its quantum annealers can be used for accelerating and enabling new methods for solving complex optimization problems, artificial intelligence, machine learning, and simulation problems. 

The company’s main competitive advantage comes from being the only player that offers commercially available annealing quantum computer systems, which can be installed on premises. However, D-Wave has yet to demonstrate the advantages of its annealing technology over classical computers despite being in operation for more than 20 years. 

Key customers and partnerships

The company operates its own quantum cloud service to build and deploy quantum computing applications, also offering access to its hardware via cloud solutions from other companies like Amazon Web Services (AWS) and 1Qbit. Its quantum annealers are in commercial use by companies such as Volkswagen and Lockheed Martin.

The company partnered with many quantum software and hardware companies including: Aramco Europe (expanded in June 2024) to manage complex geophysical optimization problems using quantum technologies; NEC (February 2024; initially entered in December 2021 ), to introduce two new quantum services in Australia to provide advanced computing solutions for commercial sectors, governments, and academic institutions; Zapata AI (February 2024), to combine generative AI and quantum computing technologies to develop commercial applications; Deloitte (January 2024), to advance quantum computing applications within the Canadian government and local businesses as a part of the Canadian national quantum strategy; QuantumBasel (October 2023- initially entered in December 2022), to accelerate quantum and quantum-hybrid application development in Europe; and Satispay (October 2023), to build a quantum-hybrid application for optimizing customer rewards programs.

Funding and financials

D-Wave went public on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in August 2022 via a special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC) merger.