Google quantum exec: US government funding would’ve come with ‘conditions’

Google didn’t take funding from the Trump administration for quantum computing because of “conditions” that would’ve prevented the tech giant from moving as quickly as it would like, an executive said Wednesday.

The US government last month announced $2 billion in grants and investments across nine quantum companies, including IBM and PsiQuantum, in a bid to bolster domestic development and take on China in quantum.

“In this one specific case, I think there were various conditions that came with the funding,” Charina Chou, chief operating officer at Google Quantum AI, said at the Semafor Tech summit in San Francisco. Google wants “to move as quickly as we can to a quantum computer,” and is working with the US government in “other ways,” she said.

PsiQuantum co-founder Pete Shadbolt, a recipient of the US funding, said it was “really natural” for the US government to invest in the sector because of quantum’s “profound geopolitical implications. It has…