IonQ, Inc. (IONQ), a quantum computing hardware and software company, said on Monday that it has inked a deal to buy Oxford Ionics, a British computer hardware firm for $1.075 billion, which consists of $1.065 billion in IONQ shares and around $10 million in cash. The transaction is expected to be closed in 2025.
This deal builds on the strategic cooperation between the U.S. and UK to unlock next-generation technologies. Niccolo de Masi, CEO of IonQ, said: "Today's announcement of our intention to acquire Oxford Ionics accelerates our mission to full fault-tolerant quantum computers with 2 million physical qubits and 80,000 logical qubits by 2030."
The combined company expects to build systems with 256 physical qubits at accuracies of 99.99% by 2026 and advance to over 10,000 physical qubits with logical accuracies of 99.99999% by 2027.
The new company aims to reach 2 million physical qubits in its quantum computers by 2030, to enable logical qubit accuracies over 99.9999999999%.
The quantum computing market is projected to create up to $850 billion of global economic value by 2040, according to Boston Consulting Group.
IONQ was up by 4.28% at $40.68 in the pre-market trade on the New York Stock Exchange.
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