• Canadian quantum annealing developer D-Wave has signed a definitive transaction agreement with DPCM Capital, a special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC), to go public on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) under the ticker symbol “QBTS.”

• After the transaction is complete—potentially in Q2 2022—the combined entity will be called D-Wave Quantum Inc. with an expected valuation of USD 1.6 billion. The company expects to raise around USD 340 million in gross proceeds, which includes USD 300 million cash held in DPCM’s trust account (assuming no redemptions) and private investment in public equity (PIPE) of more than USD 40 million from investors including Goldman Sachs and NEC Corporation. 

• The proceeds will be injected into accelerating the development and delivery of the company’s quantum technologies, including its annealers and cloud service platform; scaling its R&D efforts; building on its 200+ patents; and expanding its geographical presence across the globe. 

<ul><li> Analyst QuickTake: D-Wave joins the line of quantum startups that have chosen the SPAC pathway to go public in recent times, following Rigetti Computing —a California-based full-stack quantum computing company that announced a SPAC deal in October 2021—and IonQ —a Maryland-based quantum computing company that went public in September 2021. If the deal goes through as expected, D-Wave's estimated valuation of USD 1.6 billion could make it the second most valued quantum computing company after IonQ (USD 2 billion), surpassing Rigetti Computing (USD 1.5 billion).</ul>