Quantum company Infleqtion will join the state’s massive quantum campus at the former U.S. Steel South Works site with the goal of building the first utility-scale quantum computer in Illinois, Gov. JB Pritzker announced Wednesday.
The $50 million investment makes Infleqtion the latest company to announce its presence at the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park, where Pritzker and his allies are hoping to develop the “Silicon Valley” of quantum computing. They will join anchor tenant PsiQuantum, IBM and Diraq, among others.
The IQMP is set to open in 2027, but Infleqtion plans to bring its quantum computer to Illinois before then, according to CEO Matthew Kinsella.
“If you look at how Silicon Valley built up over the years, you can look around the country and see a few different geographies that are starting to become the early seedlings of a Silicon Valley for quantum. Chicago is very much one of them,” Kinsella told the Sun-Times. “It has all those core ingredients that Silicon Valley had — and a world-class city that’s desirable for people to want to live in and stay in.”
Infleqtion, based in Colorado, already has a quantum software team in the Loop. It plans to keep that office space, while also making its quantum computing initiatives headquartered in Illinois. The company currently has about 15 employees in Chicago.
Infleqtion agreed to create at least 50 new jobs ranging from engineering to research. Under its Manufacturing Illinois Chips for Real Opportunity Program agreement, Infleqtion will invest $14 million in the project and receive state tax credits valued at more than $5 million.
Additional grants will be available, according to Pranav Gokhale, vice president and general manager of computing at Infleqtion.
Gokhale said Infleqtion’s roots in Chicago — coupled with local research partners, customers, attractive incentives and a deep talent pool — made the IQMP an ideal location for its next quantum computer. Infleqtion will support government-funded programs such as the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency, the U.S. Army and private foundations like Wellcome Leap and commercial partners.
The quantum race has been heating up with companies like PsiQuantum wanting to build the nation’s first commercially useful quantum computer. PsiQuantum announced last year that it would build the country’s first at the state’s quantum park in 2027.
Quantum computing creates infinite combinations of the binary bits used by computers to calculate larger and more complex problems. Experts tout quantum computing’s potential to help manufacture new medical drugs and make sensitive data almost impermeable to hacking.
Kinsella believes the most compelling possibility of quantum is a chance to discover new materials.
“If you were to do that in the classical computing world … that would take you the life of the universe to do,” Kinsella said. “But that’s something a quantum computer could do almost instantly. Those are the types of problems that we’ve never really even thought about as humanity because they just aren’t possible with classical computing technologies. But quantum will unlock those. The implications to GDP [gross domestic product] and growth are huge, which is why the state of Illinois is so interested in investing so heavily behind quantum technologies.”
Kinsella and Gokhale liken a utility-scale quantum computer to ChatGPT. Artificial intelligence wasn’t as consumer-facing until OpenAI rolled out its chatbot. A utility-scale quantum computer will allow consumers to better understand how quantum computing can be used every day to solve complex problems, Gokhale said.
“We want this computer to get to the point where someone would say … ‘I can use this to help me do my job and make money off of it,’” Kinsella said.
Infleqtion’s quantum computer is compact compared to others, measuring around the size of a dinner table. Eventually, Infleqtion wants to shrink the computer down to the size of a laptop then small enough to fit in someone’s pocket.
Kinsella said the old South Works site will house its third quantum computer, after it sold models to the United Kingdom and the Institute for Molecular Science in Japan.
The company also plans to bring quantum computers to customer sites within a 12- to 18-month timeframe, he said.
Pritzker had announced plans for the 128-acre quantum park in July 2024, alongside state, county and Chicago officials. The site is estimated to have a $20 billion economic impact over the next decade and create thousands of jobs in quantum computing and related fields. It will also breathe new life into the former South Works facility, which has sat vacant since its closure 30 years ago.
Pritzker’s 2025 budget allocated $500 million in state investment to help fund quantum research, with $300 million toward building the South Works campus. The city of Chicago also allocated $5 million from Mayor Brandon Johnson’s $1.5 billion housing and economic development bond. Cook County will contribute $5 million toward the park.
“Infleqtion is an important and the latest in a line of leading quantum researchers and businesses to commit to this project, with more to come,” Pritzker said Wednesday. “Ultimately, that means good jobs and economic opportunity for Illinois. It means major leaps forward for humankind — and I mean that. Quantum has the potential to open a world of possibilities and solve some of our world’s greatest challenges, and they’ll be solved right here in the city of Chicago, in the state of Illinois, and with Infleqtion.”
The IQMP will be the first development at the 400-acre property at 8080 S. DuSable Lake Shore Dr., and it will be situated on the southern end of the site.
Phase one is expected to finish in 2027. Related Midwest and CRG are co-developing the park.
The site has seen several redevelopment proposals over the years that never came to fruition, including a new Solo Cup Co. factory and thousands of homes. And environmental concerns continue to be a concern among neighbors and environmental activists, who have been calling on the city to slow down the development process and secure a community benefits agreement.
Pritzker acknowledged the concerns of the community group Alliance of the Southeast on Wednesday but remained optimistic on the benefits the campus will bring to nearby residents.
“Everybody wants the best for their communities. I will say that a site that sits abandoned for 30 years with no jobs on it is not helpful to the community at all,” Pritzker said. “This is supercharged an endeavor to bring jobs, to bring economic opportunity to the area. That’s not to say that we all shouldn’t work hard to make sure that the community benefits from it, but it also is to say, let’s not put a stop to something that is likely to have … significant benefits for people in that area.”