Singapore, 31 March 2023 – Horizon Quantum Computing, a Singapore-based company building software development tools to unlock the potential of quantum computing hardware, announced today that it has raised USD 18.1 million Series A investment from Sequoia Capital India, Tencent, SGInnovate, Pappas Capital and Expeditions Fund.
The investment round will boost the growth of the company, allowing it to strengthen its science and engineering teams to accelerate product development, establish its new engineering centre in Europe and bring Horizon’s unique technology to the market. Horizon Quantum Computing’s total funding now stands at approximately USD 21.3 million.
“Quantum computing has the potential to completely change how we think about computing,” says Horizon’s CEO Dr Joe Fitzsimons. “While getting to large scale quantum computing is a daunting challenge, it is undeniable that progress towards that goal is being made. At Horizon, we focus on unlocking the power of future quantum computers, and have made significant headway towards our goal of enabling conventional software developers to take advantage of the technology through abstraction and automated algorithm synthesis. The new investment will support our effort to break through the barriers to useful quantum computation.”
Sequoia Capital India and SGInnovate, which led Horizon’s Seed+ and Seed rounds respectively, both reconfirmed support of the company’s ambition to provide tools to make programming of quantum computers as accessible and efficient as it is for conventional computers today.
“We have been bullish on the developer economy thesis for a long time,” says Pieter Kemps, Partner, Surge at Sequoia Capital India and Southeast Asia. “At the same time, we believe that a tectonic shift will be driven by advancements in quantum hardware. But unlocking quantum computing for the millions of developers is no small feat. Wouldn’t it be amazing if any developer could develop quantum algorithms with little to no prior quantum experience? This is the future that Horizon is enabling. We believe in Joe’s product vision around abstracting the underlying quantum physics to enable developers to create quantum software with ease, and we have been hugely impressed by the technological breakthroughs that the team has achieved in a short period of time.”
Quantum computing faces two main challenges to widespread adoption: the development of hardware capable of supporting quantum computation at scale and the creation of software tools that allow programmers to harness this hardware to solve real-world problems. Horizon Quantum Computing is focused on the second challenge, enabling domain experts to leverage quantum computing in their most demanding computational workloads. Horizon is building a system for quantum software development that enables developers to bridge the gap between classical code and quantum accelerated applications.
Horizon has already reached key milestones in its technology development, demonstrating advanced compilation techniques, algorithm synthesis and rapid device characterisation. At the Q2B conference in Silicon Valley in December 2022, Horizon demoed its integrated development environment and announced it would be launching an early access program this year.
Last year, Horizon also joined Singapore's National Quantum-Safe Network and has recently seen the first data transmission from its node. Horizon’s participation in this network is a step towards fulfilling the company’s ambition of enabling secure and privacy-preserving access to cloud-based quantum computers
Horizon Quantum Computing has also recently announced that it is opening its first European offices in Ireland where it is building out its new engineering centre. The company is currently recruiting a software engineering team in Dublin to boost worldwide operations.
About Horizon Quantum Computing
Horizon Quantum Computing is developing a new generation of programming tools to simplify and expedite the process of developing software for quantum computers. By removing the need for prior quantum computing experience to develop applications for quantum hardware, Horizon’s tools will make the power of quantum computing accessible to every software developer.
The company was founded in 2018 by Dr Joe Fitzsimons, an expert in the space of quantum computing applications. Dr Fitzsimons has over 18 years of experience in quantum computing and computational complexity theory and holds a doctorate from the University of Oxford on quantum computing architectures. The leadership team also includes Dr Si-Hui Tan, Chief Science Officer, who holds a PhD in Physics from MIT and has been actively involved in quantum research for 18 years.
Singapore, 31 March 2023 – Horizon Quantum Computing, a Singapore-based company building software development tools to unlock the potential of quantum computing hardware, announced today that it has raised USD 18.1 million Series A investment from Sequoia Capital India, Tencent, SGInnovate, Pappas Capital and Expeditions Fund.
Horizon Quantum Computing, a company building software development tools for quantum computers, today announced that it is establishing a first-of-a-kind testbed for integrating quantum computing hardware with its software stack, Triple Alpha. The testbed, which will be set up at Horizon’s Singapore headquarters, will have the capacity to host multiple quantum computers.
Horizon Quantum Computing, a company building software development tools for quantum computers, today announced that it is establishing a first-of-a-kind testbed for integrating quantum computing hardware with its software stack, Triple Alpha. The testbed, which will be set up at Horizon’s Singapore headquarters, will have the capacity to host multiple quantum computers.
Ahead of the TNW Conference in Amsterdam where our CEO Dr Joe Fitzsimons will be a speaker, he sat with Thomas Macaulay to discuss the tremendous potential of quantum computing and our industry’s current challenges, from talent shortage to the need for patient capital.
The Trinity Quantum Alliance is a new collaboration that brings together experts from research and industry, and which will provide a new custom space in Trinity East for innovative projects in quantum science and technology, simulation, education and computation in Ireland.
AWS’s Quantum Technologies Blog presents the successful trial of quantum-secured communication between the Centre for Quantum Technologies and Horizon.
In The Business Times, our CSO Dr Si-Hui Tan talks about the diverse range of expertise that are working together to make quantum computing technology widely accessible.
Horizon sponsored the 6th edition of Q2B Silicon Valley in December 2022, where the company’s CEO gave a talk “Quantum Computing Beyond the Circuit Model”.
Quantum Zeitgeist featured Horizon's CEO Joe Fitzsimons in their list of 10 quantum leaders running quantum computing companies: "We love the mission to make Quantum Computing a general-purpose quantum technology. Making quantum computing truly accessible to everyone could be a world-leading quest, and we like it!”
In an MIT Technology Review article, key quantum computing industry players are reflecting on the trends in the field. Among them, our CEO Joe Fitzsimons who gives his predictions on moving beyond the NISQ era and the need for Turing completeness.
Our CEO, Joe Fitzsimons was on the Newstalk programme Breakfast Business with Joe Lynam where he talked about Horizon’s expansion in Europe with a new office opening in Ireland along with new job opportunities.
Singapore’s great quantum quest makes the cover story of The Business Times. Our CEO Joe Fitzsimons, who was interviewed for the article, speaks about the fast development of the technology: "Year by year, month by month, even week by week, progress is made in the field."
In an interview for TechHQ, our CEO Joe Fitzsimons talks about the potential of more structured quantum algorithms over NISQ variational algorithms.
The Dublin office will be Horizon’s first outside of Singapore.
Our CEO Dr Joe Fitzsimons shared in an interview with The Irish Times about the factors that made Horizon choose Ireland for our first overseas office.
Horizon Quantum Computing is building an IDE that will help developers who are proficient in languages like C and C++ to build quantum apps.
