QBI: Quantum Benchmarking Initiative

Selection

As of Nov. 6, 2025, DARPA has selected 11 companies to enter the second stage (Stage B) of the agency’s Quantum Benchmarking Initiative (QBI), which aims to rigorously verify and validate whether any quantum computing approach can achieve utility-scale operation — meaning its computational value exceeds its cost — by the year 2033.

As QBI continues, DARPA anticipates additional teams to advance to stages A, B, and C, as described below. Companies have entered the evaluation process on varying timelines, resulting in staggered advancement across the three stages.

During the six-month Stage A, companies characterized their unique concepts for creating a useful, fault-tolerant quantum computer. Now, in the yearlong Stage B, they will develop and detail their R&D plans, including identifying and mitigating the associated risks, and specifying the necessary risk-reduction prototypes. Companies successful in Stage B will be invited to progress to QBI’s final stage, in which a government verification and validation team will determine if their utility-scale quantum computer concept can be constructed as designed and operated as intended.

Companies selected for Stage B have described compelling technical concepts and the QBI team will scour their R&D plans to determine whether they are on track to meet not only near-term milestones, but also the ultimate objective: a useful quantum computer by 2033.

A significant challenge in evaluating quantum computing development plans lies in the diversity of technological approaches. Unlike classical computing, no single dominant architecture exists. The Stage B teams employ a wide range of quantum bit (qubit) technologies – the fundamental building blocks of a quantum computer – each with its own strengths, weaknesses, and technical hurdles.

QBI is not a competition to narrow the field to a few “winners.” Rather, the aim is to evaluate each company’s approach on its own merits. Multiple, single, or even no participants will ultimately demonstrate a path to an industrially useful quantum computer within the next eight years. Thorough evaluation is crucial to understanding the true potential of the technology.

The following companies (with their qubit technology approach) have been selected for Stage B at this time:

• Atom Computing: Boulder, Colorado (scalable arrays of neutral atoms)
• Diraq: Sydney, Australia, with operations in Palo Alto, California, and Boston, Massachusetts (silicon CMOS spin qubits)
• IBM: Yorktown Heights, New York (quantum computing with modular superconducting processors)
• IonQ: College Park, Maryland (trapped-ion quantum computing)
• Nord Quantique: Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada (superconducting qubits with bosonic error correction)
• Photonic Inc.: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada (optically-linked silicon spin qubits)
• Quantinuum: Broomfield, Colorado (trapped-ion quantum charged coupled device (QCCD) architecture)
• Quantum Motion: London, UK (MOS-based silicon spin qubits)
• QuEra Computing: Boston, Massachusetts (neutral atom qubits)
• Silicon Quantum Computing Pty. Ltd.: Sydney, Australia (precision atom qubits in silicon)
• Xanadu: Toronto, Canada (photonic quantum computing)

It is likely but not guaranteed that additional teams will enter Stage B in the future. DARPA will announce any additional promotion decisions after contracting with those teams is finalized.

Summary

The Quantum Benchmarking Initiative (QBI) aims to determine if it’s possible to build an industrially useful quantum computer much faster than conventional predictions. Specifically, QBI is designed to rigorously verify and validate if any quantum computing approach can achieve utility-scale operation — meaning its computational value exceeds its cost — by the year 2033.¹ 

The Quantum Benchmarking Initiative is an expansion of the existing DARPA Underexplored Systems for Utility-Scale Quantum Computing (US2QC). QBI is separate from but related to the existing Quantum Benchmarking (QB) program that seeks to determine the yardstick for impact. 

In the simplest terms, QB seeks to answer the question: If a fully functioning quantum computer magically appeared, what would it make possible that a standard computer cannot accomplish? 

In addition to funding performers, QBI will add value to their ongoing research and development efforts by providing unbiased third-party verification and validation of an organization’s path to a utility-scale quantum computer. QBI will also effectively communicate the results of this verification and validation effort to other U.S. government stakeholders. 

Every successful QBI performer effort will progress through three critical stages: 

• Stage A: Describe a utility-scale quantum computer concept that has a plausible path to realization in the near term.
• Stage B: Describe a Research and Development Plan capable of realizing the utility-scale quantum computer, the risks associated with that plan and the planned risk mitigation steps, and the prototypes needed to burn down these risks.
• Stage C: Work with the Government to Verify and Validate that their utility-scale quantum computer concept can be constructed as designed and operated as intended. 

QBI is not a competition between performers; DARPA is interested in pursuing all viable approaches for which there is available funding.

[1] In 2023, the DARPA US2QC program stated interest in any “…truly revolutionary approach to building a useful quantum computer in the near future – less than 10 years…”