The EU launched an innovative investment plan of 627 million euros, and three quantum companies have received funding
In March 2021, the European Commission newly established the European Innovation Council (EIC), which has a budget of more than 10 billion euros from 2021 to 2027 for the development and expansion of breakthrough innovations. Last week, the European Innovation Council Accelerator formally announced an investment of 627 million euros in 99 innovative companies from 21 countries in the European Union.
At present, EIC has announced a list of 65 companies, including three quantum companies Equal1 Laboratories, QphoX and Multiverse Computing.
The selected companies will receive up to 17.5 million euros in grants and/or equity investments based on their needs. At present, 65 companies have received equity investments of up to 414 million euros (total 627 million euros). For the list of companies, please refer to the following link:
https://eic.ec.europa.eu/system/files/2021-12/EIC%20Accelerator-October%206%20Cut%20Off_0.pdf
The list does not show the amount of a single investment, but the two companies Equal1 and Multiverse have announced that they have received 10 million euros and 12.5 million euros, respectively, and QphoX has not yet been made public. The three companies are all mixed financing, including grants and equity investments.
Equal1 said that the reason it received 10 million euros in financing was their innovative contribution in the field of quantum-enhanced machine learning. The start-up company headquartered in the United States and Ireland focuses on the development of silicon-based quantum computers. In May of this year, Equal1 demonstrated the first fully integrated quantum processor unit (QPU) that operates at a "high temperature" of 3.7 Kelvin (-269.45°C) (which used to be required to operate at a millikelvin temperature). This QPU has been integrated into the company's quantum computing demonstration machine Alice) and has been in continuous operation for 18 months at its sites in Ireland and the United States.
Equal1 quantum processor
Multiverse Computing, headquartered in Spain, is the world's first company focusing on quantum computing finance. It just announced two months ago that it had received 10 million euros in seed round financing. The EIC investment consists of two parts, an equity investment of 10 million euros and a grant of 2.5 million euros.
Recently, Multiverse announced a collaboration with quantum computing hardware company IonQ to use the IonQ quantum cloud platform in the company's financial solution Singularity®, which will enable financial services organizations to model risks more accurately and faster than ever before.
Connect the quantum computer to the simple and intuitive Excel front end through the Singularity software development kit, providing a quantum financial analysis tool without changing the workflow of financial institutions.
Singularity can solve many business challenges in the financial sector, including capital allocation, fraud detection and risk management. According to Multiverse, using Singularity to optimize the entire S&P 500 takes only a few minutes, while using the current state-of-the-art algorithm is a never-ending task; the obtained portfolio also provides a higher return than the standard simplified solver , Because the latter only gives sub-optimal solutions. It can be done easily with just one click in the spreadsheet.
Singularity Quantum Finance Solution
Multiverse CEO Enrique Lizaso said that part of the funds will be used to further optimize the company's Monte Carlo asset valuation engine, as well as financial institutions and central bank derivatives evaluation capabilities and stress testing tools. As Multiverse accelerates the commercialization of its toolkit, these funds will also be used to attract and retain talent and expand into more vertical markets.
The third company, QphoX, is headquartered in the Netherlands and is developing the world's first quantum modem (Modem) device, which will connect to quantum computers via a quantum network. By networking different processors together, quantum modems will enable quantum computers to exceed 10 or 100 qubits, enabling them to handle complex tasks that classical computers cannot handle.
In May of this year, QphoX announced the completion of a round of financing of 2 million euros. Coupled with this EIC investment (the specific amount has not yet been disclosed), the company will further improve the performance of the quantum modem and develop its first independent product. With the continuous advancement of quantum computing and quantum communication, quantum modems are expected to become a catalyst to accelerate the interaction of these two technologies and realize new applications of network quantum information processing, such as remote access to quantum resources and authenticated quantum computing.
Quantum Modem workflow
Under the framework of "Horizon Europe" with a budget of approximately 100 billion euros, these companies are selected through a rigorous process, including an idea screening stage, complete applications evaluated by external experts, and collaboration with experienced investors and investors. Interview with a jury of entrepreneurs.
The selected companies are located in 21 countries, including 7 "Horizon Europe" countries with low levels of research and innovation. 65 of the 99 companies requested equity investments of up to 414 million euros (total 627 million euros). Generally speaking, these companies will receive grants in the next few months, and equity investment may take longer, because the implementation of EIC equity investment needs to be re-arranged under "Horizon Europe". This delay will also affect the companies selected in the previous round of investment.
Since the launch of the EIC accelerator in March 2021, more than 4,000 start-ups and SMEs have submitted ideas, and more than 1,800 companies have submitted complete applications in June and October.
The EIC accelerator provides start-ups and SMEs with grants of up to 2.5 million euros and equity investments of 500,000 to 15 million euros through the EIC Fund. In addition to financial support, all projects also benefit from a series of business acceleration services.
link:[1]https://eic.ec.europa.eu/news/largest-ever-funding-round-european-innovation-council-accelerator-99-innovative-companies-set-2021-12-16_en
[2]https://www.equal1.com/eic-awards-equal1-e10-million-grant-equity-investment-2/
[3]https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20211216006267/en/Multiverse-Computing-Awarded-%E2%82%AC12.5-Million-14.2M-USD-in-New-Funding-from-European-Innovation-Council
