1、s UNITED STATES SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION Washington,D.C.20549 FORM 10-K (Mark One)ANNUAL REPORT PURSUANT TO SECTION 13 OR 15(d)OF THE SECURITIES EXCHANGE ACT OF 1934 For the fiscal year ended December 31,2023 OR TRANSITION REPORT PURSUANT TO SECTION 13 OR 15(d)OF THE SECURITIES EXCHANGE AC
2、T OF 1934 FOR THE TRANSITION PERIOD FROM TO Commission File Number 001-39694 IONQ,INC.(Exact name of Registrant as specified in its charter)Delaware85-2992192(State or other jurisdiction ofincorporation or organization)(I.R.S.EmployerIdentification No.)4505 Campus DriveCollege Park,MD 20740(Address
3、of principal executive offices)(Zip Code)Registrants telephone number,including area code:(301)298-7997 Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(b)of the Act:Title of each class Trading Symbol(s)Name of each exchange on which registered Common Stock,$0.0001 par value per share Warrants,each exer
4、cisable for one share of common stock for$11.50 per shareIONQIONQ WSNew York Stock ExchangeNew York Stock ExchangeSecurities registered pursuant to Section 12(g)of the Act:None Indicate by check mark if the Registrant is a well-known seasoned issuer,as defined in Rule 405 of the Securities Act.Yes N
5、o Indicate by check mark if the Registrant is not required to file reports pursuant to Section 13 or 15(d)of the Act.Yes No Indicate by check mark whether the Registrant:(1)has filed all reports required to be filed by Section 13 or 15(d)of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 during the preceding 12
6、 months(or for such shorter period that the Registrant was required to file such reports),and(2)has been subject to such filing requirements for the past 90 days.Yes No Indicate by check mark whether the Registrant has submitted electronically every Interactive Data File required to be submitted pur
7、suant to Rule 405 of Regulation S-T(232.405 of this chapter)during the preceding 12 months(or for such shorter period that the Registrant was required to submit such files).Yes No Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is a large accelerated filer,an accelerated filer,a non-accelerated filer,
8、smaller reporting company,or an emerging growth company.See the definitions of“large accelerated filer,”“accelerated filer,”“smaller reporting company,”and“emerging growth company”in Rule 12b-2 of the Exchange Act.Large accelerated filerAccelerated filer Non-accelerated filerSmaller reporting compan
9、y Emerging growth company If an emerging growth company,indicate by check mark if the registrant has elected not to use the extended transition period for complying with any new or revised financial accounting standards provided pursuant to Section 13(a)of the Exchange Act.Indicate by check mark whe
10、ther the registrant has filed a report on and attestation to its managements assessment of the effectiveness of its internal control over financial reporting under Section 404(b)of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act(15 U.S.C.7262(b)by the registered public accounting firm that prepared or issued its audit repor
11、t.If securities are registered pursuant to Section 12(b)of the Act,indicate by check mark whether the financial statements of the registrant included in the filing reflect the correction of an error to previously issued financial statements.Indicate by check mark whether any of those error correctio
12、ns are restatements that required a recovery analysis of incentive-based compensation received by any of the registrants executive officers during the relevant recovery period pursuant to 240.10D-1(b).Indicate by check mark whether the Registrant is a shell company(as defined in Rule 12b-2 of the Ex
13、change Act).Yes No The aggregate market value of the voting and non-voting common equity held by non-affiliates of the Registrant,based on the closing price of$13.53,per share of the Registrants common stock on the New York Stock Exchange on June 30,2023,was$2.3 billion.This calculation excludes sha
14、res of the registrants common stock held by current executive officers,directors and stockholders that the registrant has concluded are affiliates of the registrant.This determination of affiliate status is not a determination for other purposes.The number of shares of registrants common stock outst
15、anding as of February 21,2024 was 208,229,519.DOCUMENTS INCORPORATED BY REFERENCE Certain information required in Item 10 through Item 14 of Part III of this Annual Report on Form 10-K is incorporated herein by reference to the Registrants definitive proxy statement for its 2024 Annual Meeting of St
16、ockholders,which shall be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission pursuant to Regulation 14A of the Securities Act of 1934,as amended.2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm1/1782025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/ed
17、gar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm2/178 Table of Contents PageCAUTIONARY NOTE REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS iiiGLOSSARY OF SELECTED TERMINOLOGY 1 PART I Item 1.Business 3Item 1A.Risk Factors 16Item 1B.Unresolved Staff Comments 49Item 1C.Cybersecurity 49Item 2.Properties 50I
18、tem 3.Legal Proceedings 51Item 4.Mine Safety Disclosures 51 PART II Item 5.Market for Registrants Common Equity,Related Stockholder Matters and Issuer Purchases of Equity Securities 52Item 6.Reserved 52Item 7.Managements Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations 53Item
19、 7A.Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures About Market Risk 61Item 8.Consolidated Financial Statements and Supplementary Data 61Item 9.Changes in and Disagreements With Accountants on Accounting and Financial Disclosure 61Item 9A.Controls and Procedures 62Item 9B.Other Information 62Item 9C.Discl
20、osure Regarding Foreign Jurisdictions that Prevent Inspections.62 PART III Item 10.Directors,Executive Officers and Corporate Governance 63Item 11.Executive Compensation 63Item 12.Security Ownership of Certain Beneficial Owners and Management and Related Stockholder Matters 63Item 13.Certain Relatio
21、nships and Related Transactions,and Director Independence 63Item 14.Principal Accountant Fees and Services 63 PART IV Item 15.Exhibit and Consolidated Financial Statements Schedules 64Item 16.Form 10-K Summary 66 SIGNATURES In this report,unless otherwise stated or the context otherwise indicates,th
22、e terms“IonQ,Inc.,”“the Company,”“we,”“us,”“our”and similar references refer to“IonQ”and our other registered and common law trade names,trademarks and service marks are property of IonQ,Inc.All other trademarks,trade names and service marks appearing in this annual report are the property of their
23、respective owners.Solely for convenience,the trademarks and trade names in this report may be referred to without the and symbols,but such references should not be construed as any indicator that their respective owners will not assert their rights thereto.i2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Arch
24、ives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm3/178 WHERE YOU CAN FIND MORE INFORMATION Investors and others should note that we announce material financial information to our investors using our investor relations website at ,press releases,filings with the U.S.Securities and Exchange
25、 Commission(“SEC”)and public conference calls and webcasts.We also use IonQs blog and the following social media channels as a means of disclosing information about the Company,our products and services,our planned financials and other announcements and attendance at upcoming investor and industry c
26、onferences,and other matters.This is in compliance with our disclosure obligations under Regulation FD:IonQ Company Blog(https:/ LinkedIn Page(https:/ X(Twitter)Account(https:/ YouTube Account(https:/ posted through these social media channels may be deemed material.Accordingly,in addition to review
27、ing our press releases,SEC filings,public conference calls and webcasts,investors should monitor IonQs blog and our other social media channels.The information we post through these channels is not part of this Annual Report on Form 10-K.The channel list on how to connect with us may be updated from
28、 time to time and is available on our investor relations website.ii2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm4/178 CAUTIONARY NOTE REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS This Annual Report on Form 10-K(this“Annual Report”)contains statements
29、that may constitute“forward-looking statements”within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933,as amended(the“Securities Act”)and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934,as amended(the“Exchange Act”)that involve substantial risks and uncertainties.All statements contained
30、in this Annual Report other than statements of historical fact,including statements regarding our future results of operations and financialposition,our business strategy and plans,and our objectives for future operations,are forward-looking statements.The words“believes,”“expects,”“intends,”“estima
31、tes,”“projects,”“anticipates,”“will,”“plan,”“may,”“should,”or similar language are intended to identify forward-looking statements.These forward-looking statements include statements concerning the following:our financial and business performance,including financial projections and business metrics;
32、changes in our strategy,future operations,financial position,estimated revenues and losses,projected costs,prospects and plans;the implementation,market acceptance and success of our business model and growth strategy;our expectations and forecasts with respect to market opportunity and market growt
33、h;our ability to sell full quantum computing systems to customers,either over the cloud or for local access;the ability of our products and services to meet customers compliance and regulatory needs;our ability to attract and retain qualified employees and management;our ability to adapt to changes
34、in customer preferences,perception and spending habits and develop and expand our product offerings and gain market acceptance of our products,including in new geographies;our ability to develop and maintain our brand and reputation;developments and projections relating to our competitors and indust
35、ry;our expectations regarding our ability to obtain and maintain intellectual property protection and not infringe on the rights of others;the impact of global economic and political developments on our business,as well as the value of our common stock and our ability to access capital markets;the i
36、mpact of public health crises,or geopolitical tensions,in and around Ukraine,Israel and other areas of the world,on our business and the actions we may take in response thereto;our future capital requirements and sources and uses of cash;our ability to obtain funding for our operations and future gr
37、owth;and our business,expansion plans and opportunities.You should not rely on forward-looking statements as predictions of future events.We have based the forward-looking statements contained in this Annual Report primarily on our current expectations and projections about future events and trends
38、that we believe may affect our business,financial condition and operating results.The outcome of the events described in these forward-looking statements is subject to risks,uncertainties and other factors described in the section titled“Risk Factors”and elsewhere in this Annual Report.A summary of
39、selected risks associated with our business are set forth below.Moreover,we operate in a very competitive and rapidly changing environment.New risks and uncertainties emerge from time to time,and it is not possible for us to predict all risks and uncertainties that could have an impact on the forwar
40、d-looking statements contained in this Annual Report.The results,events and circumstances reflected in the forward-looking statements may not be achieved or occur,and actual results,events or circumstances could differ materially from those described in the forward-looking statements.In addition,sta
41、tements that“we believe”and similar statements reflect our beliefs and opinions on the relevant subject.These statements are based on information available to us as of the date of this Annual Report.While we believe that information provides a reasonable basis for these statements,that information m
42、ay be limited or incomplete.Our statements should not be read to indicate that we have conducted an exhaustive inquiry into,or review of,all relevant information.These statements are inherently uncertain,and investors are cautioned not to unduly rely on these statements.iii2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/
43、www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm5/178 The forward-looking statements made in this Annual Report relate only to events as of the date on which the statements are made.We undertake no obligation to update any forward-looking statements made in this Annual Re
44、port to reflect events or circumstances after the date of this Annual Report or to reflect new information or the occurrence of unanticipated events,except as required by law.We may not actually achieve the plans,intentions or expectations disclosed in our forward-looking statements,and you should n
45、ot place undue reliance on our forward-looking statements.Our forward-looking statements do not reflect the potential impact of any future acquisitions,mergers,dispositions,joint ventures or investments.iv2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231
46、231.htm6/178 GLOSSARY OF SELECTED TERMINOLOGYAs used in this Annual Report on Form 10-K,unless the context otherwise requires,references to the following terms have the respective meaning as defined below:Algorithmic Qubit:A metric describing the number of“useful”qubits in a system,considering noise
47、,connectivity limitations,and other sources of error.Barium:A silvery rare-earth metal,atomic number 56,that can be used as a qubit for quantum computing.IonQ has recently started exploring barium as an alternative qubit species because its slightly more complex structure offers higher fundamental g
48、ate and readout fidelities when controlled correctly,and because it primarily interacts with light in the visible spectrum,allowing additional opportunities for standard fiber optic technologies in parts of the system.Classical Computer:A computer that stores and calculates information using classic
49、al mechanics:information is stored as a 0 or a 1,in a transistor.Coherence Time:A measurement of the“lifetime”of a qubit,coherence time measures how long a qubit can maintain coherent phase,which allows it to successfully retain quantum information and behave in the ways necessary for it to be part
50、of a useful computation.Entanglement:A property of quantum mechanics where two particles,even when physically separated,behave in ways conditionally dependent on each other.Error-Corrected Qubit:Groups of physical qubits that are logically combined using techniques called error correction encoding w
51、ith the goal of having them act together as one much higher-quality qubit for computational purposes.Fault Tolerance:A systems ability to accommodate errors in its operation without losing the information it is processing and/or storing.Gate Fidelity/Error Rate:A measure of how much noise(or error)i
52、s introduced in each operation during a quantum algorithm.Ion Trap:An apparatus that holds ions in place,ready for computation,in a trapped-ion quantum computer.Measurement:The process at the end of a quantum computation where the exponentially large computational space available during computation
53、collapses down to a binary string in order to produce readable results.Multi-Core QPU:A single quantum processor that has multiple quantum compute zones that can compute in parallel and be entangled via moving and recombining ion chains.Noise:For quantum computers to compute correctly,they must be i
54、solated from the environment around them.Any interaction with the environment,or imperfection in the control systems that perform gates,introduces noise.As noise accumulates,the overall likelihood that an algorithm will produce a successful answer goes down.With too much noise,a quantum computer is
55、no longer useful at all.Photonic Interconnect:A connection between two qubits using photons,typically via a fiber optic cable.A photonic interconnect is used to remotely connect two qubits.Physical Qubit:The hardware implementation of a qubit in a quantum computer.Quantum Algorithm:A series of quant
56、um logic gates that together solve a specific problem.Quantum Bit(Qubit):The quantum equivalent of bits in classical computing,able to exist in a superposition of states and be entangled with other qubits.Quantum Circuit:A collection of quantum logic gates to be run in a specific order on a given se
57、t of qubits.Quantum Logic Gate(s):Gates used to manipulate the state of qubits,including putting them in superposition states and creating entanglement.2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm7/17812025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Ar
58、chives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm8/178 Quantum Processing Unit(QPU):A complete system made up of physical qubits and the apparatus for controlling them.Superconducting Qubit:A qubit implementation that uses specialized silicon-fabricated chips at ultracold temperatures.S
59、ynthetic(Fabricated)Qubit:A qubit that uses an engineered or“manufactured”quantum system,rather than a naturally occurring one.Examples of synthetic(fabricated)qubits include superconducting transmon qubits and semiconductor quantum dot qubits.Trapped Ion Qubit:A qubit implementation using charged a
60、tomic particles(ions)suspended in vacuum and manipulated with lasers.22025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm9/178 PART I Item 1.Business.Overview We are developing quantum computers designed to solve some of the worlds most complex prob
61、lems,and transform business,society and the planet for the better.We believe that our proprietary technology,our architecture and the technology exclusively available to us through license agreements will offer us advantages both in terms of research and development,as well as the commercial value o
62、f our intended product offerings.Today,we sell specialized quantum computing hardware together with related maintenance and support.We also sell access to several quantum computers of various qubit capacities and are in the process of researching and developing technologies for quantum computers wit
63、h increasing computational capabilities.We currently make access to our quantum computers available via three major cloud platforms,Amazon Web Services(“AWS”)Amazon Braket,Microsofts Azure Quantum and Googles Cloud Marketplace,and also to select customers via our own cloud service.This cloud-based a
64、pproach enables the broad availability of quantum-computing-as-a-service(“QCaaS”).We supplement our offerings with professional services focused on assisting our customers in applying quantum computing to their businesses.We also expect to sell full quantum computing systems to customers,either over
65、 the cloud or for local access.We are still in the early stages of commercial growth.Since our inception,we have incurred significant operating losses.Our ability to generate revenue sufficient to achieve profitability will depend heavily on the successful development and further commercialization o
66、f our quantum computing systems.Our net losses were$157.8 million and$48.5 million for the years ended December 31,2023 and 2022,respectively,and we expect to continue to incur significant losses for the foreseeable future.As of December 31,2023,we had an accumulated deficit of$352.1 million.We expe
67、ct to continue to incur losses for the foreseeable future as we prioritize reaching the technical milestones necessary to achieve an increasingly higher number of stable qubits and higher levels of fidelity than presently existsprerequisites for quantum computing to reach broad quantum advantage.The
68、 Quantum Opportunity Throughout human history,technological breakthroughs have dramatically transformed society and altered the trajectory of economic productivity.In the 19th century,it was the industrial revolution,powered by the scientific advances that brought us steam-powered machines,electrici
69、ty,and advanced medicine.These technologies drastically improved human productivity and lengthened life expectancy.In the 20th century,computingarguably the greatest of all human inventionsleveraged human intelligence to run complex calculations,paving the way for profound advances in virtually ever
70、y realm of human experience,including information processing,communication,energy,transportation,biotechnology,pharmaceuticals,agriculture and industry.Since classical computing emerged in the mid-twentieth century,there has been exponential progress in computer design,with processing power roughly
71、doubling every few years(Moores law).The true economic and social impact of computing is difficult to measure because it has so thoroughly permeated every aspect of life,altering the trajectory of society.However,as transformative as computing has been,many classes of problems strain the ability of
72、classical computers,and some will never be solvable with classical computing.In this traditional binary approach to computing,information is stored in bits that are represented logically by either a 0(off)or a 1(on).Quantum computing uses information in a fundamentally different way than classical c
73、omputing.Quantum computers are based on quantum bits(qubits),a fundamental unit that can exist in both states 0 and 1 simultaneously(superposition).As a result,we believe that quantum computers can address a set of problems classical computing may never solve.The types of problems that currently def
74、eat classical computing include:the simulation of quantum systems(e.g.,in materials science or pharmaceuticals);number factoring for decryption;and complex optimization problems.Many of these problems are fundamental,involving societys most pressing needs,such as how to live sustainably on our plane
75、t,how to cure diseases,and howto efficiently move people and goods.Classical computers cannot solve these problems because the calculations would take far too long(i.e.,millions to trillions of years)or because the problems involve quantum systems that are far too complex to be represented ona class
76、ical computer,even if their remarkable pace of development were to continue indefinitely.While these problems are not solvable by todays quantum computers,we believe that a quantum computer currently offers the best possibility for computational power that could be used to solve them.The future succ
77、ess of quantum computing will be based on the development of a computer with a substantially higher number of qubits than our current computers.We believe that we will find solutions to these challenges and that our proprietary technology and 2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data
78、/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm10/17832025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm11/178 architecture and the technology exclusively available to us through exclusive license agreements will offer advantages both in terms of res
79、earch and development as well as the ultimate product we wish to offer customers.There are certainly thousands,if not millions,of important and fundamental unanswered questions about how the universe works and opportunities associated with the answers to those questions.We envision a future powered
80、by quantum computing and believe the 21st century is poised to be the dawn of this era.Our Strategy Our mission is to be the leading quantum computing company enabling the new era of quantum computing.We intend to fulfill our mission by:Leveraging Our Technology.We believe that our technology offers
81、 substantial technological advantages compared to other competing quantum computing systems.We intend to build upon our technological lead by leveraging our world-class team of leaders and engineers who are pioneers in quantum computing,with proven track records in innovation and technical leadershi
82、p.To date,we have developed and assembled nine generations of quantum computer prototypes and systems,have constructed quantum operating systems and software tools,and have worked with leading cloud vendors,quantum programming languages and quantum software development kits(“SDKs”).Selling Direct Ac
83、cess to Quantum Computers.We sell specialized quantum computing hardware to select customers,complemented by access to quantum experts and algorithm development capabilities.We intend to sell direct access to the quantum computers we manufacture,with units offered on a whole system or usage basis.We
84、 believe that by offering direct access to quantum computing,supplemented by our professional services,we can assist select customers in deepening their application of quantum solutions.Offering QCaaS.We provide QCaaS,complemented by access to quantum experts and algorithm development capabilities.W
85、e manufacture,own and operate quantum computers.Our quantum computing solution is currently delivered via AWSs Amazon Braket,Microsofts Azure Quantum and Googles Cloud Marketplace.We believe that by offering QCaaS,we can accelerate the adoption of our quantum computing solutions,while efficiently pr
86、omoting quantumcomputing across our partner ecosystems.Continuing to Enhance Our Proprietary Position.We have exclusively licensed our core technology from the University of Maryland and Duke University(together,the“Universities”),and our complex technology is protected by an extensive patent portfo
87、lio.We intend to continue to drive innovation in quantum computing and seek intellectual property protection where appropriate to enhance our proprietary technology position.Further Developing Our Quantum Computing Partner Ecosystem.We believe our relationships with leading technology enterprises an
88、d university research institutes will accelerate innovation,distribution and monetization of our quantum capabilities.Market Opportunity:A Future Driven by Quantum Computing The potential uses for quantum applications are widespread and address a number of problems that would be impossible to solve
89、using classical computing technology.Below are a few of the use cases in which we believe quantum computers,if they are successfully developed,will become an important tool for businesses to remain competitive in the market over the coming years.Quantum Simulations in Chemistry We believe that there
90、 are thousands of problems that could benefit from these quantum algorithms across the pharmaceutical,chemical,energy and materials industries.An example of such a simulation problem is modeling the core molecule in the nitrogen fixation process to make fertilizer.Nature is able to fixate nitrogen(i
91、.e.,turn atmospheric nitrogen into more useful ammonia)at room temperature.Scientists,however,have only been able to achieve fixation using a resource-intensive,high-temperature,high-pressure process,called the Haber-Bosch process.A cornerstone of the global agriculture industry,the Haber-Bosch proc
92、ess consumes about one percent of the worlds energy and produces about one percent of the worlds carbon dioxide.Agronomists have attempted to model the core molecule in natures nitrogen fixation process,but the molecule is too large for todays classical supercomputers to simulate.Understanding the q
93、uantum process used in nature to fixate nitrogen could lead directly to more efficient ways for scientists to do the same.Quantum chemistry simulation is expected to impact multiple markets and become an essential tool in chemical industries.For example,computer-aided drug discovery in the pharmaceu
94、tical industry is limited by the computing time and resources required to simulate a large enough chemical system with sufficient accuracy to be useful.If future generations of more powerful quantum computers are successfully developed,we believe that we could improve the speed and accuracy of virtu
95、al high-throughput screening 2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm12/17842025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm13/178 and improve the molecular docking predictions used in
96、 structure-based drug discovery,dramatically reducing the development cost of new drugs and reducing the time to market.Similarly,we believe that developing a detailed understanding of chemical reactions critical to various industries,such as catalytic reaction in battery chemistry for electric vehi
97、cles,can lead to higher performing solutions with extended energy storage capacity.Quantum Algorithms for Monte Carlo Simulations Monte Carlo simulations are probability simulations used to calculate the expected distribution of possible outcomes in hard-to-predict processes involving random variabl
98、es.Such simulations are used pervasively in finance,banking,logistics,economics,engineering and applied sciences.A key parameter of Monte Carlo simulations is the degree of accuracy desired to attain with the result.To obtain 99.9%accuracy,a classical computer requires around one million simulations
99、.Quantum algorithms,however,can achieve the same accuracy using only one thousand simulations,thereby significantly reducing the time it takes to perform Monte Carlo simulations.This is especially important when running these simulations is expensive.One application of the quantum Monte Carlo algori
100、thm is to price options for the financial industry.Simple options models are used ubiquitously in finance,the most famous of these being the Black-Scholes model.However,these models fail to capture the complexities of real markets,and financiers use more sophisticated simulations to obtain better mo
101、del predictions.Currently,many of these models are limited by the number of simulations required to reach the desired accuracy within a fixed time budget.Quantum algorithms for Monte Carlo simulations could give some financial firms a competitive advantage by enabling them to price options more quic
102、kly.Quantum Algorithms for Optimization Optimization problems have enormous economic significance in many industries,and they often cannot be solved with classical computers due to their daunting complexity.Quantum algorithms are naturally suited for problems in which an exponential number of possib
103、ilities must be considered before an optimized output can be identified.It is widely believed that quantum computers will be able to arrive at a better approximate optimization solution than classical computers can,and with reduced computational cost and time.One method of quantum optimization is a
104、hybrid method called the Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm,in which layers of quantum computations are executed within circuit parameters optimized using classical high-performance computers.Because optimization issues bedevil so many complicated processes in industries ranging from logisti
105、cs to pharmaceutical drug design to climate modeling,the application of quantum algorithms to optimization problems could have far-reaching impacts on society.Quantum Machine Learning Quantum computers can generate probability distributions that cannot be efficiently simulated on a classical compute
106、r.Similarly,there are probability distributions that can only be efficiently distinguished from each other using a quantum computer.In these examples,models utilizing quantum circuits can be used to capture complex internal structures in the data set much more effectively than classical models.In ot
107、her words,quantum computers can“learn”things that are beyond the capabilities of classical computers.Quantum computing is likely to offer new machine-learning modalities,greatly improving existing classical machine learning when used in tandem with it.Examples of areas where quantum machine learning
108、 could have an impact are risk analysis in finance,natural language processing,and classification of multivariate data such as images and chemical structures.Machine learning is used broadly in industry today,and we believe quantum machine learning could have a similarly broad impact.As with any com
109、pletely new technology,the use cases imagined by us today are only a subset of the opportunities that will emerge if future generations of more powerful quantum computers are successfully developed,as users understand the power of quantum algorithms.Remaining Challenges in Quantum Computing Evolutio
110、n One can compare any particular quantum algorithms performance to the best classical algorithm for the same problem.The point at which a quantum computer is able to perform a particular computation that exceeds its classical counterpart in speed or reduces its cost to solution is known as the point
111、 of“quantum advantage.”Given the substantial research and development required to build a modern quantum computer that is both functional and practical,industry experts describe the remaining challenges in quantum computing to achieve quantum advantage as being solved in three phases.Although none o
112、f these challenges have yet been fully solved,we believe that we are well positioned to do so.A 2019 52025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm14/1782025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-
113、20231231.htm15/178 publicly available report by a leading third-party consulting firm describes these phasesand the associated technical barriersas paraphrased below:Noisy and intermediate-scale quantum(NISQ)computers:The earliest stage of development will see component demonstrations and intermedia
114、te-scale system development with limited commercial application.The main technical barrier involves the mitigation of errors through improved fabrication and engineering of underlying qubit devices and advanced control techniques for the qubits.These devices are used for developing and validating fu
115、ndamentally new quantum approaches to tackling difficult problems,but are not expected to generate substantial commercial revenues.Broad quantum advantage:In this stage,quantum computers are expected to provide an advantage over classical computers with a meaningful commercial impact.The main techni
116、cal barrier is the deployment of quantum error-correcting codes that allow bigger applications to be executed.If this barrier can be overcome,we believe that quantum computing will offer practical solutions to meaningful problems superior to those provided by classical computers.Full-scale fault tol
117、erance:This last stage will see large modular quantum computers with enough power to tackle a wide array of commercial applications relevant to many sectors of the economy.At this stage,classical computers are expected to no longer compete with quantum computers in many fields.The technical barrier
118、will be the adoption of a modular quantum computer architecture that allows the scalable manufacturing of large quantum computer systems.Building a Quantum Computer Requirements for Building Useful Quantum Computers Quantum computers are difficult to build and operate because the physical system of
119、qubits must be nearly perfectly isolated from its environment to faithfully store quantum information.Yet the system must also be precisely controlled through the application of quantum gate operations,and it must ultimately be measured with high accuracy.A practical quantum computer requires well-i
120、solated,near-perfect qubits that are cheap,replicable and scalable,along with the ability to initialize,control and measure their states.Breakthroughs in physics,engineering,and classical computing were prerequisites for building a quantum computer,which is why for many decades the task was beyond t
121、he limits of available technology.To execute computational tasks,a quantum computer must be able to(i)initialize and store quantum information in qubits,(ii)operate quantum gates to modify information stored in qubits and(iii)output measurable results.Each of these steps must be accomplished with su
122、fficiently low error rates to produce reliable results.Moreover,to be practical,a quantum computer must be economical in cost and scalable in compute power(i.e.,the number of qubits and the number of gate operations)to handle real world problems.The development of large-scale quantum computing syste
123、ms is still in early stages,and several potential engineering architectures for how to build a quantum computer have emerged.We are developing quantum computers based on individual atoms as the core qubit technology,which we believe has key advantages in scaling.The ability to produce cheap error-co
124、rrected qubits at scale in a modular architecture is one of the key differentiators of our approach.Today,we have achieved many engineering firsts in this field and we believe that,with our focus on achieving additional technical milestones over the next few years,we are well positioned to bring qua
125、ntum computing advantage to the commercial market.Scientific Approaches to Quantum Computing There are a variety of different approaches to(or architectures for)building a quantum computer,each of which involves tradeoffs in meeting the three functional and practical requirements outlined above.Roug
126、hly,approaches to performing a quantum computation fall into one of three categories:natural quantum bits,solid state or classical computer simulation.Natural quantum bits:In natural qubit-based quantum computers,a system is built around naturally occurring substrates exhibiting quantum properties.A
127、toms:In atomic-based quantum computers,the qubits are represented by internal states of individual atoms trapped and isolated in a vacuum.There are two categories within this approach:the use of ionized(charged)atoms and the use of neutral atoms.Photons:In this approach,the state of a photon,a parti
128、cle of light,is used as the qubit.Various aspects of a photon,such as presence/absence,polarization,frequency(color)or its temporal location can be used to represent a qubit.62025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm16/178 Solid state:In s
129、olid-state-based quantum computers,the qubits are engineered into the system.Spins in semiconductors:This approach uses the spins of individual electrons or atomic nuclei in a semiconductor matrix.There are two categories within this approach:(1)the use of electrons trapped in quantum dot structures
130、 fabricated by lithographic techniques and(2)the use of atomic defects(or dopants)that capture single electrons.The nuclear spin of the dopant atoms,or the nearby atoms to defects,are often used to store qubits.Superconducting circuits:This approach uses circuits fabricated using superconducting mat
131、erial that features quantum phenomena at cryogenic temperatures.Two states of the circuit,either charge states or states of circulating current,are used as the qubit.Classical computer simulation:Classical computers in a data center can be used to simulate quantum computers.Although useful for small
132、-scale quantum experiments,quantum simulation on classical computers is still bound by the same limitations of classical computing and would require an impractical number of data centers to tackle meaningful quantum problems.Our Technology Approach Our Approach to Quantum Computing:Trapped Ions We h
133、ave adopted the atom-based approach described above and use trapped atomic ions as the foundational qubits to construct practical quantum computers.We are pursuing a modular computing architecture to scale our quantum computers,meaning that,if successful,individual quantum processing units will be c
134、onnected to form increasingly powerful systems.We believe that the ion trap approach offers the following advantages over other approaches:Atomic qubits are natures qubits:Using atoms as qubits means that every qubit is exactly identical and perfectly quantum.This is why atomic qubits are used in th
135、e atomic clocks that do the precise timekeeping for mankind.Many other quantum systems rely upon fabricated qubits,which bring about imprecisions such that no single qubit is exactly the same as any other qubit in the system.For example,every superconducting qubit comes with a different frequency(or
136、 must be tuned toa frequency)due to manufacturing imprecision.Overall,we believe that systems relying upon fabrication of their qubits are more susceptible to error.Trapped ion qubits are well-isolated from environmental influences:When a quantum system interacts with its environment,the quantum sta
137、te loses coherence and is no longer useful for computing.For example,in a superconducting qubit,the qubit tends to lose its coherence within approximately 10 to 50 microseconds.Even neutral atoms are perturbed to some extent when they are trapped in space.In contrast,trapped ion qubits are confined
138、via electric fields in an ultra-high vacuum environment,and their internal qubits are hence perfectly isolated.As a result,the coherence of trapped ions can be preserved for about an hour,and may be able to be preserved for longer if isolation technology improves.Longer coherence times mean more com
139、putations can be performed before noise overwhelms the quantum calculation and are keyto minimizing the overhead of error correction needed for large-scale quantum computers.Lower overhead for quantum error-correction.Quantum error-correction will likely be necessary to reduce the operational errors
140、 in any large-scale quantum computations relevant to commercial problems.Quantum error-correction uses multiple physical qubits to create an error-corrected qubit with lower levels of operational errors.For solid-state architectures,we estimate that it may take at least 1,000 physical qubits to form
141、 a single error-corrected qubit,while for near-term applications with ion traps the ratio is closer to 16:1.Trapped ion quantum computers can run at room temperature:Solid-state qubits currently require temperatures close to absolute zero(i.e.,-273.15C,or-459.67F)to minimize external interference an
142、d noise levels.Maintaining the correct temperature requires the use of large and expensive dilution refrigerators,which can hamper a systems long-term scalability because the cooling space,and hence the system space,is limited.Trapped ion systems,on the other hand,can operate at room temperature.Thi
143、s is because the qubits themselves are not in thermal contact with the environment,as they are electromagnetically confined in free space inside a vacuum chamber.Although modest cryogenics(10 degrees above absolute zero)can be used to dramatically improve the vacuum environment,the inherent properti
144、es of the qubits themselves do not degrade at room temperature.The laser-cooling of the qubits themselves is extremely efficient because the atomic ions have very little mass and this requires just a single low-power laser beam(microwatts).This allows us to minimize the system size as technology pro
145、gresses,while scaling the compute power and simultaneously reducing costs.All-to-all connectivity:In superconducting and other solid-state architectures,individual qubits are connected via physical wires,hence a particular qubit can only communicate with a further-removed qubit by going through the
146、qubits that lie in-between.In the trapped ion approach,however,qubits are connected by electrostatic repulsion rather than through physical wires.As a result,qubits in our existing systems can directly interact with any other qubit in the system.Our modular architecture benefits from this flexible c
147、onnectivity,significantly reducing the complexity of implementing a given quantum circuit.2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm17/17872025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.ht
148、m18/178 Ion traps require no novel manufacturing capabilities:Ion trap chips consist of electrodes and their electrical connections,which are built using existing technologies.The trap chips themselves are not quantum materials.They simply provide the conditions for the ion qubits to be trapped in s
149、pace,and in their current state,they can be fabricated with existing conventional and standard silicon or other micro-fabrication technologies.By contrast,solid-state qubits,such as superconducting qubits or solid-state silicon spins,require exotic materials and fabrication processes that demand ato
150、mic perfection in the structures of the qubits and their surroundings;fabrication with this level of precision is an unsolved challenge.Technological Complexity Creates Significant Barriers to Entry Alongside the benefits of the trapped ion approach,there are several challenges inherent in it that s
151、erve as barriers-to-entry,strengthening the advantages of our systems.These key challenges include:Complex laser systems:One of the challenges of trapped ion quantum computing is the set of lasers required and the degree to which they must be stable to operate the system.Traditionally,these laser sy
152、stems were assembled on an optical table on a component-by-component basis,which led to serious stability and reliability issues.We believe that we have resolved this issue from an engineering standpoint and that our future roadmap will further improve manufacturability.Ultra-high vacuum(UHV)technol
153、ogy:The conventional method to achieve UHV conditions for ion trapping experiments involves using vacuum chamber designs with carefully chosen materials,assembly procedures with cumbersome electricalconnections,and a conditioning procedure to prepare and bake the chamber at elevated temperatures for
154、 extended periods of time.We have developed new approaches,such as environmental conditioning,that we believe will substantially reduce the time and cost to prepare the UHV environment to operate the quantum computer.Executing high fidelity gates with all-to-all connectivity:While trapped ion qubits
155、 feature the highest fidelity entangling gates,it is nevertheless a major technical challenge to design a control scheme that enables all qubits in a system to form gates with each other under full software control.Through innovation in gate-implementation protocols,we believe that we have developed
156、 laser delivery and control systems that will allow us to implement fully programmable,fully connected gate schemes in our system.Slow gate speeds:Compared to their solid-state counterparts,trapped ions are widely believed to have slow gate speeds.While slow gate speeds are the case for many systems
157、 in operation today,both theoretical analyses and experimental demonstrations suggest this may not be a fundamental limit of trapped ion qubits(although this has not yet been demonstrated in commercial applications).In fact,high-fidelity gates with speeds comparable to those of solid-state qubitshav
158、e been realized in several research laboratories.We expect that our future quantum computers based on barium ions will be faster,more powerful,more easily interconnected,and that feature more uptime for customers.Moreover,we believe that as systems with other qubit technologies scale up,their restri
159、cted connectivity and high error-correction overhead will significantly slow down their overall computation time,which we believe will make the trapped ion approach more competitive in terms of operational speed.Our Trapped Ion Implementation The specific implementation of our trapped ion systems le
160、verages the inherent advantages of the substrate and creates what we believe is a path for building stable,replicable and scalable quantum computers.Trapped Ion Infrastructure Our systems are built on individual atomic ions that serve as the computers qubits.Maintaining identical,replicable,and cost
161、-effective qubits is critical to our potential competitive advantage,and we have developed a process to produce,confine and manipulate atomic ion qubits.To create trapped atomic ion qubits using our approach,a solid source containing the element of interest is either evaporated or laser-ablated to c
162、reate a vapor of atoms.Laser light is then used to strip one electron selectively from each of only those atoms of a particular isotope,creating an electrically charged ion.Ions are then confined in a specific configuration of electromagnetic fields created by the trapping structure(i.e.,the ion tra
163、p),to which their motion is confined due to their charge.The trapping is done in an UHV chamber to keep the ions well-isolated from the environment.Isolating and loading a specific isotope of a specific atomic species ensures each qubit in the system is identical.Two internal electronic states of th
164、e atom are selected to serve as the qubit for each ion.The two atomic states have enough frequency separation that the qubit is easy to measure through fluorescence detection when an appropriate laser beam is applied.2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/00009501702402207
165、2/ionq-20231231.htm19/17882025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm20/178 To build quantum computers,many atomic ions are held in a single trap,and the repulsion from their charges naturally forces them into a stable linear crystal(or chai
166、n)of qubits.The qubits are highly isolated in the UHV chamber,only perturbed by occasional collisions with residual molecules in the chamber,which provides near-perfect quantum memory that lasts much longer than most currently envisioned quantum computing tasks require.The qubits are initialized and
167、 measured through a system of external gated laser beams.An additional set of gated laser beams applies a force to selected ions and modulates the electrical repulsion between the ions.This process allows the creation of quantum logic gates between any pair of qubits,regardless of their distance wit
168、hin the crystal,which can be arbitrarily reconfigured in software.System Modularity and Scalability Today,all qubits in our systems are stored on a single chip,referred to as a quantum processing unit(“QPU”).QPUs can have several cores,or zones for trapping chains of ions,comparable to multicore cen
169、tral processing unit(“CPU”)chips in classical computing.Each core can contain up to about 100 qubits in a linear crystal,and dozens of cores can potentially be co-located in a single QPU.Within a QPU,some qubits can be physically moved between cores to accommodate quantum communication between the c
170、ores.This process of moving ions within a QPU is called“shuttling”and is achieved by modifying the electromagnetic fields that form the trap.In addition to increasing the number of qubits per QPU,we believe we have identified,and we are currently developing,the technology needed to connect qubits be
171、tween trapped ion QPUs,which may be commercially viable in the future.This technology,known as a photonic interconnect,uses light particles to communicate between qubits while keeping information stored stably on either end of the interconnect.The basic protocol for this photonic interconnect betwee
172、n ion traps in two different vacuum chambers was first realized in 2007.We believe this protocol can be combined with all-optical switching technology to enable multi-QPU quantum computers at large scale.We at IonQ have assembled a team with deep expertise in photonics and are designing Photonic Int
173、erconnects that will enable our systems to compute with entangled qubits spanning multiple QPUs.We believe this can open up the possibility of scaling quantum computers indefinitely,similar to how high-performance computers and data centers have been scaled.Our quantum architecture is modular,meanin
174、g that if development of this architecture is successful,the number of qubits in a QPU,or the number of QPUs in a system,could be scaled.Also,by allowing for each qubit in a system to entangle with any other qubit in that system,we believe that a systems number of quantum gates could increase rapidl
175、y with each additional qubit added.This all-to-all connectivity is one of the key reasons we believe our systems will be computationally powerful.Gate Configuration Our qubits are manipulated(for initialization,detection,and forming quantum logic gates)by shining specific laser beams onto the trappe
176、d ions.Our systems employ a set of lasers and a sophisticated optical system to deliver beams precisely tailored to achieve this manipulation.The laser beams are tailored by programming radio frequency(“RF”)signals using state-of-the-art digital chipsets,which are custom-configured to generate the s
177、ignals for qubit manipulation.An operating system manages the quantum computer,maintaining the system in operation.It includes software toolsets for converting quantum programs from users into a set of instructions the computer hardware can execute to yield the desired computational results.To suppo
178、rt system access from the cloud,we offer cloud management tools and application programming interfaces(“APIs”)that permit programming jobs to run remotely.Our quantum gates are fully programmable in software;there is no“hard-wiring”of qubit connections in the quantum computing hardware.The structure
179、 of a quantum circuit or algorithm can therefore be optimized in software,and the appropriate laser beams can then be generated,switched,or modulated to execute any pattern of gate interactions.Our programmable gate configurations make our systems adaptable.Unlike quantum computer systems that are l
180、imited to a single class of problems due to their architecture,we believe that any computational problem with arbitrary internal algorithmic structure could be optimized to run onour system(although this has not been demonstrated at scale).Quantum Error Correction A key milestone in building larger
181、quantum computers is achieving fault-tolerant quantum error-correction.In quantum error-correction,individual physical qubits prone to errors are combined to form an error-corrected qubit(sometimes referred to as a logical qubit)with a much lower error rate.Determining how many physical qubits are n
182、eeded to form a more reliable logical qubit(the resource“overhead”)depends on both the error rate of the physical qubits and the specific error-correcting codes used.In 2020,a teamof researchers at the University of Maryland,including some current IonQ employees,demonstrated the first fault-tolerant
183、 error-corrected qubit using 13 trapped ion qubits.With our unique architecture,we believe quantum error-correction can be completely coded in software,allowing varying levels and depths of quantum error-correction to be deployed as needed.Because the ion qubits feature very low idle and native erro
184、r rates and are highly connected,we expect the error-correction overhead to be about 16:1 to achieve the first useful quantum applications.This contrasts with other approaches,for which we estimate the overhead to be in the range of 1,000:1 to 100,000:1.2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives
185、/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm21/17892025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm22/178 We believe our architectural decisions will make our systems uniquely capable of achieving scale.We have published a roadmapfor
186、scaling to larger quantum computing systems,with concrete technological innovations designed to significantly improve the performance of the systems.For example,in 2022,we announced that through our partnership with the U.S.Department of Energys Pacific Northwest National Laboratory(“PNNL”),we were
187、able to shrink the barium source material down to a microscopic scale.We believe this is significant because it will allow us to reduce the size of core system components,an important step in the creation of quantum computers small enough to be networked together.However,meeting future milestones in
188、cluded in our roadmap is not guaranteed and is dependent on various technological advancements,which could take longer than expected to realize or turn out to be impossible to achieve.We believe that,with engineering advancements and firsts yet to be achieved,our quantum computers will become increa
189、singly compact and transportable,opening up future applications of quantum computing at the edge.Our Forward-Looking Roadmap In December 2020,we publicly released a forward-looking technical roadmap for the next eight years.Our technical roadmap was designed to provide transparent guidance to our qu
190、antum computer users regarding when we expect certain quantum computing capabilities to become available.As part of this roadmap,we introduced the notion of“algorithmic qubits”as a metric to measure progress,and a detailed description of how to define and measure the number of algorithmic qubits(#AQ
191、)in early 2022.Roughly speaking,#AQ represents the total number of qubits that can be used to perform a quantum computational task that involves an order of(#AQ)2 entangling gate operations in a list of quantum algorithms that reflect representative real-world use cases of a quantum computer.This me
192、tric provides a simple and effective measure to estimate the computational power of each generation of quantum computers.At low#AQ,the size of the problem the quantum computer can tackle is limited by the error rate of the entangling gate operations,rather than by the number of physical qubits avail
193、able in the computer.The aggressive push for improving the power of quantum computers,including the early introduction of quantum error-correction,is intended to significantly compress the time required for reaching the point when we expect quantum computers may become commercially impactful at scal
194、e.We believe that many of the technological components needed to accomplish the performance goals of the roadmap,such as high-fidelity gate operations,photonic interconnects and quantum error-correction,have been realized in proof-of-concept demonstrations in trapped ion systems.Given our track reco
195、rd of engineering and technology development,we believe that,over time,we will be able to successfully translate these technology components into products,which may enable successful deployment of our quantum computers and deliver material commercial value to customers.We are targeting a Modular Arc
196、hitecture,Designed to Scale,resulting in Smaller Systems and Cheaper Compute Power for Each Generation The scaling of classical computer technology,which unlocked continuously growing markets over many decades,was driven by exponential growth in computational power coupled with exponential reduction
197、 in the cost of computational power for each generation(Moores law).The key economic driver permitting the expansion of digital computer applications to new segments of the market was this very phenomenon of capability doubling in each generation with costs rising only modestly.We believe the scalin
198、g of quantum computing may follow a similar trajectory:as the#AQ available in each generation scales,the per-AQ cost is also reduced and enables true scaling of quantum computers.Our systems have benefited from years of architectural focus on scalability that addresses both#AQ and per-AQ cost and,as
199、 such,we believe that if we are able to successfully solve remaining scalability challenges,these systems may become increasingly powerful and accessible in tandem.At the heart of our approach is the modular architecture that may enable such growth.We expect our future systems to be modular networks
200、 of many QPUs working together as a large quantum computer,similar to how classical data centers are designed,constructed and operated today.Our engineering effort is focused on reducing the size,weight,cost and power consumption of the QPUs that will be the center of each generation of the modular
201、quantum computer,while increasing the number of QPUs manufactured each year.We intend to focus on achieving these engineering efforts over the next several years.If successful,we expect that we may be able to achieve compact,lightweight and reliable quantum computers,which can be deployed at the edg
202、e,similarly to how personal computers have enabled new applications for both government and commercial use.Our Business Model Quantum Computing and the Compute Access Model As quantum hardware matures,we expect the quantum computing industry to increasingly focus on practical applications for real-w
203、orld problems,known as quantum algorithms.Today,we believe that there are a large number of quantum algorithms widely thought to offer advantages over classical algorithms in that each of these algorithms can solve a problem more efficiently,or in a different manner,than a classical algorithm.Our bu
204、siness model is premised on the belief that businesses with access to quantum computers will likely have a competitive advantage in the future.2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm23/178102025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/
205、edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm24/178 We envision providing quantum computing services,complemented by access to quantum experts and algorithm development capabilities,to solve some of the most challenging issues facing corporations,governments and other large-scale entities
206、today.We intend to manufacture,own and operate quantum computers,with compute units being offered to potential customers through system hardware sales and on a QCaaS basis.We expect our target markets to experience two stages of quantum algorithm deployment:the development stage and the application
207、stage.We expect our involvement in these two stages,to the extent they will take place,to be as follows:During the development stage,our experts will assist customers in developing an algorithm to solve their business challenges.Customers may be expected to pay for quantum compute usage,in addition
208、to an incremental amount for the consulting and development services provided in the creation of algorithms.We may choose to sell this computing time to customers in a variety of ways.In this stage,we expect revenue to be unevenly distributed,with individual customers potentially contributing to pea
209、ks in bookings.During the application stage,once an algorithm is fully developed for a market,we anticipate that customers would be charged to run the algorithm on our hardware.Given the mission critical nature of the use cases we anticipate quantum computing will attract,we believe a usage-based re
210、venue model will result in a steady stream of revenue while providing the incremental ability to grow with customers as their algorithm complexity and inputs scale.Our Customer Journey In each new market that stands to benefit from quantum computing,we intend to guide our customers and partners thro
211、ugh two stages:the development phase and the application phase.Development Phase:This first stage focuses on quantum algorithm development and we expect it to involve deep partnerships between us and our customers to lay the groundwork for applying quantum solutions to the customers industry.We also
212、 anticipate uneven revenue for this period given that the quantum computing market is still nascent.We expect the development phase for each market to be characterized by the following go-to-market channels:Co-development of quantum applications with strategic partners.We intend to form long-term pa
213、rtnerships with select industry-leading companies(aligned with our technology roadmap)to co-develop end-to-end solutions for the partner and to provide an early-adopter advantage to the partner in their industry.IonQ has announced co-development agreements with Hyundai Motor Company to pursue soluti
214、ons for battery chemistry and with ZapataAI and the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency(DARPA),to help establish the next generation of benchmarking for quantum computers.Preferred compute agreements with clients.We expect our preferred offerings to give the customers application engineers
215、direct access to our cutting-edge quantum systems,as well as technical support to pursue their solution development.Dedicated hardware.We sell certain specialized quantum computing hardware to select customers.We also anticipate manufacturing and selling complete quantum systems for dedicated use by
216、 a single customer,to be hosted on premises by the customer or remotely by us.Cloud access to quantum computing.Our current and future cloud partnerships with AWSs Amazon Braket,Microsofts Azure Quantum,Googles Cloud Marketplace and other cloud providers are designed and will continue to be designed
217、 to make access to quantum computing hardware available to a broader community of quantum programmers.Application Phase:This second phase is expected to commence if we are successful in demonstrating the commercial viability of quantum advantage in the industry and can therefore commence with develo
218、ping commercial applications and applying that advantage broadly throughout the market with new customers.Delivery of a full-scale quantum compute platform.For customers who have worked alongside us in the development phase to curate deep in-house technical expertise in quantum computing capabilitie
219、s at the time quantum advantage is achieved for the customers application,our preferred compute agreements,cloud offerings,and dedicated hardware sales are expected to offer sufficient quantum computational capacity.Packaged solution offerings.When appropriate,we may develop full-stack quantum solut
220、ions that can be provided directly to customers,regardless of their in-house quantum expertise.Accelerated high-impact applications development.We intend to provide opportunities for accelerated applications development to customers seeking compressed development timelines to solve some of their big
221、gest problems and drive efficiencies.2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm25/178112025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm26/178 We expect the technical complexity of the so
222、lutions required for quantum algorithms to address how each application area will impact the timing of that markets inflection point and transition from the development phase to the application phase.During the NISQ computing era,we expect quantum machine learning to be the first solution to transit
223、ion into broadly available applications.Additional markets taking advantage of quantum material science research and optimization speed-ups may come online next if broad-scale quantum advantage becomes accessible.If our quantum computers achieve full-scale fault tolerance,a diverse array of industri
224、es,ranging from quantum chemistry to deeper optimization,may be able to be transitioned to the application phase.Customers and Prospects Quantum Computing Systems and Hardware We sell certain specialized quantum computing hardware to select customers.We are also engaged with certain prospects who ar
225、e interested in purchasing partial or entire quantum computing systems,either over the cloud or for local access.Direct Access Customers By directly integrating with us,customers can reserve dedicated execution windows,receive concierge-level application development support,gain early access to next
226、-generation hardware,or host their own quantum computer.Such access is currently limited to a select group of end-users.We expect our standard offerings will include additional bundled value-add services in exchange for an annual commitment,such as reserved system time,consultations with solution sc
227、ientists,and other application and integration support.QCaaSWe sell access to our quantum computing solutions via AWSs Amazon Braket,Microsofts Azure Quantum,and Googles Cloud Marketplace,and directly to select customers via our own cloud service.Making systems available through the cloud in both ca
228、ses enables wide distribution.Through our cloud service providers,potential customers across the world in industry,academia and government can access our quantum hardware with just a few clicks.These platforms serve an important purpose in the quantum ecosystem,allowing virtually anyone to try our s
229、ystems without an upfront commitment or needing to integrate with our platform.Government Agencies Our customers,potential customers and partners include government agencies such as the United States Air Force Research Lab.Government agencies and large organizations often undertake a significant eva
230、luation process.Our contracts with government agencies are typically structured in phases,with each phase subject to satisfaction of certain conditions.Agreements with the University of Maryland and Duke University Exclusive License Agreement In July 2016,we entered into a license agreement with the
231、 University of Maryland(UMD)and Duke University(“Duke”),which was subsequently amended in September 2017,October 2017,October 2018,February 2021,April 2021,September 2021,and January 2023(as amended,the“License Agreement”),under which we obtained a worldwide,royalty-free,sublicensable license under
232、certain patents,know-how and other intellectual property to develop,manufacture and commercialize products for use in certain licensed fields,the scope of which includes the application of the licensed intellectual property in ion trap quantum computing.The License Agreement provides an exclusive li
233、cense under the Universities interest in all patents(and non-exclusive for other types of intellectual property),subject to certain governmental rights and retained rights by the Universities and other non-profit institutions to use and practice the licensed patents and technology for internal resea
234、rch and other non-profit purposes.We also entered into an exclusive option agreement(“Option Agreement”)with each of the Universities in 2016 whereby we have the right to exclusively license additional intellectual property developed by the Universities by exercising an annual option and issuing a c
235、ertain number of common shares to each of Duke and UMD.We are obligated to use commercially reasonable efforts to commercialize the inventions covered by the licensed patent rights and achieve certain milestones,including the hiring of a Chief Executive Officer,obtaining equity financing by specifie
236、d times and such other milestones that we may specify in a development plan provided by us to the Universities.We have met all existing milestones as provided for in the License Agreement,have not included any additional milestones in any development plan provided to the Universities,and no longer h
237、ave any obligation to submit any future development plans to the Universities.We are also responsible for the prosecution and maintenance of the licensed patents,at our expense and using commercially reasonable efforts.We have the sole right to enforce the licensed patents,at our expense.2025/1/17 1
238、4:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm27/178122025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm28/178 We may terminate the License Agreement at any time for any reason with at least 90 days writ
239、ten notice to UMD.UMD and Duke may terminate the License Agreement if we enter into an insolvency-related event or in the event of our material breach of the agreement or other specified obligations therein,in each case,that remains uncured for 90 days after the date that it is provided with written
240、 notice of such breach by either university.In consideration for the rights granted to us under the License Agreement,we issued UMD and Duke shares of our common stock.Pursuant to Dukes policy,Jungsang Kim,our Chief Technology Officer and Director,may receive remuneration from Duke relating to any s
241、tock we have issued to Duke.Option Agreement with Duke University In July 2016,we entered into an option agreement with Duke,which was subsequently amended in December 2020 and March 2021(as amended,the“Duke Option Agreement”),under which it obtained the right to add Dukes interests in certain paten
242、ts or other intellectual property to the License Agreement,including if they were developed by Jungsang Kim,Christopher Monroe or Kenneth Brown,a professor at Duke,or by individuals under their respective supervision and such patents or intellectual property relates to the field of quantum informati
243、on processing devices.We have added patents and other intellectual property to the License Agreement through the Duke Option Agreement.Pursuant to the terms of the Duke Option Agreement,we issued Duke shares of common stock,including shares of common stock issued pursuant to the amendment of the Duk
244、e Option Agreement.The Duke Option Agreement terminates in July 2026.Lease with the University of Maryland In March 2020,we entered into an amended and restated office lease with UMD for the lease of our corporate headquarters and our research and development and manufacturing facility.This lease ex
245、pires on December 31,2030.We may terminate this lease with not less than 120 days written notice beginning in year six.Any early termination will result in a termination fee ranging from$2.5 million in year six to$0.5 million in year ten,with each year subject to a reduction of$0.5 million.Annual ba
246、se rent starts at$0.7 million and increases approximately 3.0%each subsequent year.Contracts with the University of MarylandIn September 2021,we entered into a contract with UMD to provide certain quantum computing services and facility access(the“UMD Quantum Agreement”)related to the National Quant
247、um Lab at UMD in exchange for payments totaling$14.0 million over three years.Over the term of the contract,we estimate that we will make payments to UMD of approximately$1.4 million,including acontribution of$1.0 million to establish the IonQ Endowed Professorship in the College of Computer,Mathema
248、tical and Natural Sciences at UMD.The pledge and other estimated payments to UMD will not be an exchange for distinct goods or services under the provisions of ASC 606 and therefore are considered a reduction of the transaction price for the UMD Quantum Agreement.The transaction price is currently e
249、stimated at$12.6 million,reflecting this reduction.In July 2022,we entered into an agreement to provide customized quantum computing hardware to UMD for a transaction price of$0.7 million.Competition There are many other approaches to quantum computing that use qubit technology besides the trapped i
250、on approach we are taking.In some cases,conflicting marketing messages from these competitors can lead to confusion among our potential customer base.Large technology companies such as Google and IBM,and startup companies such as Rigetti Computing,are adopting a superconducting circuit technology ap
251、proach,in which small amounts of electrical current circulate in a loop of superconducting material(usually metal where the electrical resistance vanishes at low temperatures).The directionality of the current flow,in such an example,can represent the two quantum states of a qubit.An advantage of su
252、perconducting qubits is that the microfabrication technology developed for silicon devices can be leveraged to make the qubits on a chip;however,a disadvantage of superconducting qubits is that they need to be operated in a cryogenic environment at near absolute-zero temperatures,and it is difficult
253、 to scale the cryogenic technology.Compared to the trapped ion approach,the qubits generated via superconducting suffer from short coherence times,high error rates,limited connectivity,and higher estimated error-correction overhead(ranging from 1,000:1 to 100,000:1 to realize the error-corrected qub
254、its from physical qubits).There are companies pursuing photonic qubits,such as PsiQuantum and Xanadu,among others.PsiQuantum uses photons(i.e.,individual particles of light)as qubits,whereas Xanadu uses a combination of photons and a collective state of many photons,known as continuous variable enta
255、ngled states,as the qubits.Each companys approach leverages silicon photonics technology to fabricate highly integrated on-chip photonic devices to achieve scaling.The advantages to this approach are that photons are cheap to generate,they can remain coherent depending on the property of the photons
256、 used as the qubit,and they integrate well with recently-developed silicon photonics technology;however,the disadvantages of photonic qubit approaches include the lack of high-quality storage 2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm29/178
257、132025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm30/178 devices for the qubits(photons move at the speed of light)and weak gate interactions(photons do not interact with one another easily).Both of these problems lead to photon loss during compu
258、tation.Additionally,this approach requires quantum error correcting protocols with high overhead(10,000:1 or more).Several other companies use a trapped ion quantum computing approach similar to ours,including Quantinuum Ltd.and Alpine Quantum Technologies GmbH.These companies share the fundamental
259、advantages of the atomic qubit enjoyed by our approach.The differences between our technology and that of these companies lies in our processor architecture,system design and implementation and our strategies to scale.Based on publicly available information,Quantinuum processors operate with the app
260、lication circuits broken down to two qubits at a time,with a bus width of two,and the ion qubits are shuffled between each gate operation.Our processor core involves a wide-bus architecture,where the interaction among a few dozens of atomic ion qubits can be controlled using programmable laser pulse
261、s.This typically allows quantum logic gates between all possible pairs of qubits in the processor core without extraneous operations,which will enable us to operate some quantum gates that are not possible on other quantum architectures.We have also demonstrated the ability to shuttle multiple proce
262、ssor cores on the same chip,increasing the potential qubit capacity of a system.At scale,we believe these architectural features will confer benefits in the speed and efficiency of running algorithms.At a higher level,our scaling architecture will exploit optical interconnects among multiple QPUs in
263、 a way that allows full connectivity between any pair of qubits across the entire system.The modular scaling of multiple QPUs with photonic interconnects is unique in our architecture.Lastly,there are alternative approaches to quantum computing being pursued by other private companies as well as the
264、 research departments at major universities or educational institutions.For example,D-Wave computing produces quantum annealers,a separate form of computing technology that hopes to tackle a class of problems with some overlap to those solved by quantum computing.Another example is QuEra,which hopes
265、 to use neutral rubidium atom arrays to build quantum computers.Intellectual Property We rely on a combination of the intellectual property protections afforded by patent,copyright,trademark and trade secret laws in the United States and other jurisdictions,as well as license agreements and other co
266、ntractual protections,to establish,maintain and enforce rights in our proprietary technologies.Unpatented research,development,know-how and engineering skills make an important contribution to our business.We pursue patent protection only when it is consistent with our overall strategy for safeguard
267、ing intellectual property.In addition,we seek to protect our intellectual property rights through non-disclosure and invention assignment agreements with our employees and consultants and through non-disclosure agreements with business partners and other third parties.We have accumulated a broad pat
268、ent portfolio,both owned and exclusively licensed,across a range of technological fronts that relate to our systems and will continue to protect our inventions in the United States and other countries.Our patent portfolio is deepest in the area of devices,methods and algorithms for controlling and m
269、anipulating trapped ions for quantum computing.Our trade secrets primarily cover the design,configuration,operation and testing of our trapped-ion quantum computers.As of February 1,2024,we own or license,on an exclusive basis,82 issued U.S.patents and 185 pending or allowed U.S.patentapplications,2
270、1 issued foreign patents and 137 pending or allowed foreign patent applications,8 registered U.S.trademarks and 14 pending U.S.trademark applications,and 22 registered international trademarks and 2 pending international trademark applications.Our issued patents expire between 2029 and 2041.Human Ca
271、pital Management Our employees are critical to our success.As of December 31,2023,we had a 324 person-strong team of quantum hardware and software developers,engineers,and general and administrative staff.Approximately 38%of our full-time employees are based in the greater Washington,D.C.metropolita
272、n area and approximately 26%of our full-time employees are based in the greater Seattle,WA metropolitan area.We also engage a small number of consultants and contractors to supplement our permanent workforce.A majority of our employees are engaged in research and development and related functions,an
273、d more than half of our research and development employees hold advanced engineering and scientific degrees,including many from the worlds top universities.To date,we have not experienced any work stoppages and maintain good working relationships with our employees.None of our employees are subject
274、to a collective bargaining agreement or are represented by a labor union at this time.Corporate Information IonQ,formerly known as dMY Technology Group,Inc.III(“dMY”)was incorporated in the state of Delaware in September 2020,and formed as a special purpose acquisition company.Our wholly owned subsi
275、diary,IonQ Quantum,Inc.(formerly known as IonQ,Inc.,and referred to as“Legacy IonQ”herein),was incorporated in the state of Delaware in September 2015.2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm31/178142025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/A
276、rchives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm32/178 On March 7,2021,Legacy IonQ entered into an Agreement and Plan of Merger(the“Merger Agreement”),with dMY and Ion Trap Acquisition Inc.,a direct,wholly owned subsidiary of dMY(the“Merger Sub”).Pursuant to the Merger Agreement,on Se
277、ptember 30,2021,the Merger Sub was merged with and into Legacy IonQ with Legacy IonQ continuing as the surviving corporation following the merger,becoming a wholly owned subsidiary of dMY and the separate corporate existence of the Merger Sub ceased(the“Business Combination”).Commensurate with the c
278、losing of the Business Combination,dMY changed its name to IonQ,Inc.and Legacy IonQ changed its name to IonQ Quantum,Inc.Our principal executive offices are located at 4505 Campus Drive,College Park,MD 20740,and our telephone number is(301)298-7997.Our corporate website address is .Information conta
279、ined on or accessible through our website is not a part of this Annual Report,and the inclusion of our website address in this Annual Report is an inactive textual reference only.Available Information Our website address is .We make available on our website,free of charge,our Annual Reports,our Quar
280、terly Reports on Form 10-Q and our Current Reports on Form 8-K and any amendments to those reports filed or furnished pursuant to Section 13(a)or 15(d)of the Exchange Act,as soon as reasonably practicable after we electronically file such material with,or furnish it to,the Securities and Exchange Co
281、mmission(the“SEC”).The SEC maintains a website that contains reports,proxy and information statements and other information regarding our filings at www.sec.gov.The information found on our website is not incorporated by reference into this Annual Report or any other report we file with or furnish t
282、o the SEC.152025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm33/178 Item 1A.Risk Factors.RISK FACTORS Investing in our securities involves a high degree of risk.Before you make a decision to buy our securities,in addition to the risks and uncertai
283、nties described above under“Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements,”you should carefully consider the risks and uncertainties described below together with all of the other information contained in this Annual Report.If any of the events or developments described below were to occur,ou
284、r business,prospects,operating results and financial condition could suffer materially,the trading price of our common stock could decline,and you could lose all or part of your investment.The risks and uncertainties described below are not the only ones we face.Additional risks and uncertainties no
285、t presently known to us or that we currently believe to be immaterial may also adversely affect our business.Summary Risk Factors Our business is subject to a number of risks of which you should be aware before making a decision to invest in our securities.These risks include,among others,the follow
286、ing:We are an early-stage company and have a limited operating history,which makes it difficult to forecast our future results of operations.We have a history of operating losses and expect to incur significant expenses and continuing losses for the foreseeable future.We may not be able to scale our
287、 business quickly enough to meet customer and market demand,which could result in lower profitability or cause us to fail to execute on our business strategies.We may not manage our growth effectively.Our management has limited experience in operating a public company.Our estimates of market opportu
288、nity and forecasts of market growth may prove to be inaccurate.Even if the market in which we compete achieves the forecasted growth,our business could fail to grow at similar rates,if at all.Our operating and financial results forecast relies in large part upon assumptions and analyses we developed
289、.If these assumptions or analyses prove to be incorrect,our actual operating results may be materially different from our forecasted results.We may need additional capital to pursue our business objectives and respond to business opportunities,challenges or unforeseen circumstances,and we cannot be
290、sure that additional financing will be available.We have not produced a scalable quantum computer and face significant barriers in our attempts to produce quantum computers.The quantum computing industry is competitive on a global scale and we may not be successful in competing in this industry or e
291、stablishing and maintaining confidence in our long-term business prospects among current and future partnersand customers.We have experienced in the past,and could also suffer disruptions,outages,defects and other performance and quality problems with our quantum computing systems,our private cloud,
292、our research and development activities,our testbeds,our facilities,or with the public cloud,internet,and other infrastructure on which they rely.Even if we are successful in developing quantum computing systems and executing our strategy,competitors in the industry may achieve technological breakth
293、roughs that render our quantum computing systems obsolete or inferior to other products.We may be negatively impacted by any early obsolescence of our quantum computing technology.We may be unable to reduce the cost per qubit sufficiently,which may prevent us from pricing our quantum systems competi
294、tively.The quantum computing industry is in its early stages and volatile,and if it does not develop,if it develops slower than we expect,if it develops in a manner that does not require use of our quantum computing solutions,if it encounters negative publicity or if our solution does not drive comm
295、ercial engagement,the growth of our business will be harmed.2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm34/178162025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm35/178 If our computers fail
296、 to achieve a broad quantum advantage,our business,financial condition and future prospects may be harmed.We have and may continue to face supply chain issues that could delay the introduction of our product and negatively impact our business and operating results.If we cannot successfully execute o
297、n our strategy or achieve our objectives in a timely manner,our business,financial condition and results of operations could be harmed.Our products may not achieve market success,but will still require significant costs to develop.We are highly dependent on our key employees who have specialized kno
298、wledge,and our ability to attract and retain senior management and other key employees is critical to our success.We may not be able to accurately estimate the future supply and demand for our quantum computers,which could result ina variety of inefficiencies in our business and hinder our ability t
299、o generate revenue.Much of our revenue is concentrated in a few customers,and if we lose any of these customers through contract terminations,acquisitions,or other means,our revenue may decrease substantially.Our systems depend on the use of a particular isotope of an atomic element that provides qu
300、bits for our ion trap technology.If we are unable to procure these isotopically enriched atomic samples,or are unable to do so on a timely and cost-effective basis,and in sufficient quantities,we may incur significant costs or delays,which could negatively affect our operations and business.If our q
301、uantum computing systems are not compatible with some or all industry-standard software and hardware in the future,our business could be harmed.If we are unable to maintain our current strategic partnerships or we are unable to develop future collaborative partnerships,our future growth and developm
302、ent could be negatively impacted.Our business depends on our customers abilities to implement useful quantum algorithms and sufficient quantum resources for their business.Our future growth and success depend in part on our ability to sell effectively to government entities and large enterprises.Con
303、tracts with government and state agencies are subject to a number of challenges and risks.Our future growth and success depend on our ability to sell effectively to large customers.If our information technology systems,data,or physical facilities,or those of third parties upon which we rely,are or w
304、ere compromised,we could experience adverse business consequences resulting from such compromise.Unfavorable conditions in our industry or the global economy,could limit our ability to grow our business and negatively affect our results of operations.Government actions and regulations,such as tariff
305、s and trade protection measures,may adversely impact our business,including our ability to obtain products from our suppliers.Because our success depends,in part,on our ability to expand sales internationally,our business will be susceptible to risks associated with international operations.Licensin
306、g of intellectual property is of critical importance to our business.If we are unable to obtain and maintain patent protection for our products and technology,or if the scope of the patent protection obtained is not sufficiently broad or robust,our competitors could develop and commercialize product
307、s and technology similar or identical to ours,and our ability to successfully commercialize our products and technology may be adversely affected.Moreover,our trade secrets could be compromised,which could cause us to lose the competitive advantage resulting from these trade secrets.We may face pate
308、nt infringement and other intellectual property claims that could be costly to defend,result in injunctions and significant damage awards or other costs and limit our ability to use certain key technologies in the future or require development of non-infringing products,services,or technologies.Some
309、 of our in-licensed intellectual property,including the intellectual property licensed from the University of Maryland and Duke University,has been conceived or developed through government-funded research and thus may be subject to federal regulations providing for certain rights for the U.S.govern
310、ment or imposing certain obligations on us and compliance with such regulations may limit our exclusive rights and our ability to contract with non-U.S.manufacturers.2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm36/178172025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps
311、:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm37/178 If our operating and financial performance in any given period does not meet the guidance provided to the public or the expectations of investment analysts,the market price of our common stock may decline.Our quarte
312、rly operating results may fluctuate significantly and could fall below the expectations of securities analysts and investors due to several factors,some of which are beyond our control,resulting in a decline in our stock price.Risks Related to Our Financial Condition and Status as an Early Stage Com
313、pany We are an early-stage company and have a limited operating history,which makes it difficult to forecast our future results of operations.As a result of our limited operating history,our ability to accurately forecast our future results of operations is limited and subject to a number of uncerta
314、inties,including our ability to plan for and model future growth.Our ability to generate revenues will largely be dependent on our ability to develop and produce quantum computers with increasing numbers of algorithmic qubits.As a result,our scalable business model has not been formed and it is poss
315、ible that neither our December 2020 forward-looking technical roadmap nor our latest technical roadmap will be realized as quickly as expected,or even at all.The development of our scalable business model will likely require the incurrence of a substantially higher level of costs than incurred to da
316、te,while our revenues will not substantially increase until more powerful,scalable computers are produced,which requires a number of technological advancements that may not occur on the currently anticipated timetable or at all.As a result,our historical results should not be considered indicative o
317、f our future performance.Further,in future periods,our growth could slow or decline for a number of reasons,including but not limited to slowing demand for our service offerings,increased competition,changes to technology,inability to scale up our technology,a decrease in the growth of the overall m
318、arket,or our failure,for any reason,to continue to take advantage of growth opportunities.We have also encountered,and will continue to encounter,risks and uncertainties frequently experienced by growing companies in rapidly changing industries.If our assumptions regarding these risks and uncertaint
319、ies and our future growth are incorrect or change,or if we do not address these risks successfully,our operating and financial results could differ materially from our expectations,and our business could suffer.Our success as a business ultimately relies upon fundamental research and development bre
320、akthroughs in the coming years and decade.There is no certainty these research and development milestones will be achieved as quickly as expected,or even at all.We have a history of operating losses and expect to incur significant expenses and continuing losses for the foreseeable future.We have his
321、torically experienced net losses from operations.For the year ended December 31,2023,we incurred a loss from operations of$157.8 million.As of December 31,2023,we had an accumulated deficit of$352.1 million.We believe that we will continue to incur losses each year until at least the time we begin s
322、ignificant production and delivery of our quantum computers.Even with significant production,such production may never become profitable.We expect the rate at which we will incur operating losses to be significantly higher in future periods as we,among other things,continue to incur significant expe
323、nses in connection with the design,development and construction of our quantum computers,and as we expand our research and development activities,invest in manufacturing capabilities,build up inventories of components for our quantum computers,increase our sales and marketing activities,develop our
324、distribution infrastructure,and increase our general and administrative functions to support our growing operations and costs of being a public company.We may find that these efforts are more expensive than we currently anticipate or that these efforts may not result in revenues,which would further
325、increase our losses.If we are unable to achieve and/or sustain profitability,or if we are unable to achieve the growth that we expect from these investments,it could have a material adverse effect on our business,financial condition or results of operations.Our business model is unproven and may nev
326、er allow us to cover our costs.We may not be able to scale our business quickly enough to meet customer and market demand,which could result in lower profitability or cause us to fail to execute on our business strategies.In order to grow our business,we will need to continually evolve and scale our
327、 business and operations to meet customer and market demand.Quantum computing technology has never been sold at large-scale commercial levels.Evolving and scaling our business and operations places increased demands on our management as well as our financial and operational resources to:effectively
328、manage organizational change;design scalable processes;accelerate and/or refocus research and development activities;2025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/000095017024022072/ionq-20231231.htm38/178182025/1/17 14:3610-Khttps:/www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1824920/0000950
329、17024022072/ionq-20231231.htm39/178 expand manufacturing,supply chain and distribution capacity;increase sales and marketing efforts;broaden customer-support and services capabilities;maintain or increase operational efficiencies;scale support operations in a cost-effective manner;implement appropri
330、ate operational and financial systems;and maintain effective financial disclosure controls and procedures.Commercial production of quantum computers may never occur.We have no experience in producing large quantities of our products and are currently constructing advanced generations of our products
331、.As noted above,there are significant technological and logistical challenges associated with developing,producing,marketing,selling and distributing products in the advanced technology industry,including our products,and we may not be able to resolve all of the difficulties that may arise in a time
332、ly or cost-effective manner,or at all.We may not be able to cost-effectively manage production at a scale or quality consistent with customer demand in a timely or economical manner.Our ability to scale is dependent also upon components we must source from the optical,electronics and semiconductor i
333、ndustries.Shortages or supply interruptions in any of these components will adversely impact our ability to deliver revenues.The stability of ion traps may prove poorer than hoped,or more difficult to manufacture.It may also prove more difficult or even impossible to reliably entangle/connect ion traps together.Both of these factors would adversely impact scalability and costs of the ion trap syst
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