IonQ, Inc. (NYSE: IONQ)
Second Quarter 2026 Earnings Call
Categorized & Cross-Referenced Index — Line-Numbered Edition
Call Date: August 5, 2026 |
Index Prepared for Quantum Technology Integration Series Research Use
How to Use This Document
Every paragraph of the call transcript has been assigned a sequential line number (L001–L095), grouped by speaker turn. The category indices below reference these line numbers so that any topic — a financial metric, a named customer, a technology milestone, a regulatory item, an analyst's question, a forward-looking claim — can be traced directly to its source statement in the numbered transcript beginning on the page following the indices.
A single statement is frequently cross-referenced under multiple categories where it carries more than one type of information (e.g., a customer deployment that is both a Geography item and an Ecosystem/Partnership item). This edition adds three cross-reference axes beyond the original release: a full per-analyst Q&A directory (Section XIII), a Forward-Looking Statements & Guidance index tagged by claim type (Section XIV), and Slide/Page and Named-Entity cross-references (Sections XV-XVI) for tying statements back to the investor presentation and to specific organizations.
This document was checked programmatically against the source transcript prior to release: every category line reference was validated as in-range, and every figure in the Quick-Reference tables was confirmed to appear verbatim in its cited line.
Editor's Note on Accuracy
This transcript was produced from an automated speech-to-text pass over the original call audio, then corrected for speaker names, company names, and known technical/product terms (IonQ, SkyWater, Oxford Ionics, Nexus Photonics, Tempo, KISTI, Quantum Basel, QLDPC, etc.). A small number of terms remain uncertain in the source audio and are flagged both inline (in brackets) and in the dedicated Transcription Uncertainty Flags index (Section XIV) — verify these against the official transcript or replay before citing in published research.
This document is a working research tool and has not been verified against IonQ's official transcript, replay, or SEC filings. Figures and quotes intended for publication should be confirmed against the official source.
Quick-Reference Tables
Key Financial & Operating Figures
Metric | Value | Line Ref. |
Q2 2026 Revenue (GAAP) | $80.1 million (+287% YoY) | L007, L027 |
Consecutive Record Quarters | 5th consecutive | L007 |
Beat vs. Internal Expectations | +20% | L027 |
Q2 2026 Organic Revenue Growth (YoY) | 132% | L030, L071 |
FY2026 Organic Revenue Growth Guide | ~100% (reaffirmed) | L030, L043 |
International Revenue Share (Q2) | ~50% | L033 |
Countries Served | 50+ | L033 |
Commercial (non-U.S.-govt) Revenue Share | ~60% | L034 |
Multi-Product Revenue Share (Q2) | ~25% (+40% YoY) | L035 |
Remaining Performance Obligations (RPO), Q2 2026 | $485 million | L036 |
RPO, Q1 2026 | ~$470 million | L036 |
RPO, Q2 2025 (year-ago) | ~$122 million | L036 |
GAAP Operating Expenses (Q2) | $417.3 million | L037 |
Non-GAAP Operating Expenses (Q2) | $201.2 million | L037 |
Non-GAAP R&D Spend (Q2) | $160.6 million | L037 |
Adjusted EBITDA (Q2) | -$120.3 million | L039 |
Incremental SkyWater-Related Spend (Q2) | ~$20 million | L039 |
Pre-Integration Costs (Q2) | ~$10 million | L039 |
GAAP Net Loss (Q2) | -$1.9 billion | L040 |
Warrant Mark-to-Market Non-Cash Impact | ~$1.6 billion [see Flag L040] | L040 |
FY2026 Revenue Guidance (IonQ standalone, raised) | $280M-$290M | L042 |
SkyWater Acquisition Value | ~$1.8 billion | L017 |
Estimated FY2026 IonQ->SkyWater Intercompany Spend | ~$120 million | L042, L073 |
Cumulative Investment (SkyWater + Oxford Ionics) | ~$3 billion | L077 |
SkyWater Pre-Close Consensus Revenue (analyst-cited) | ~$610 million | L072 |
Implied 2H 2026 Guidance (analyst-cited) | ~$135M-$145M [see Flag L088] | L088 |
SkyLoom Optical Terminals on Orbit | 84 (2x YoY) | L031 |
Two-Qubit Gate Fidelity (Oct. 2025 record) | 99.99% (no ground-state cooling) | L012 |
Near-Term Qubit Target / Timing | 256 qubits, commissioning 2027 (1H 2027 target per L055) | L014, L055, L075 |
Longer-Term Qubit Roadmap | 10,000 -> 100,000 -> 1,000,000+ qubits | L053, L064 |
Corporate Actions / M&A Timeline
Date / Period | Event | Line Ref. |
September 2025 | Oxford Ionics acquisition closed | L012 |
October 2025 | World-record two-qubit gate fidelity announced (99.99%) | L012 |
February 2026 | Three tape-out rounds completed for first semiconductor-based chip | L013 |
May 2026 | First chip prototypes received back | L013 |
Q2 2026 | Nexus Photonics (UC Santa Barbara spinoff) acquisition closed | L020 |
Q2 2026 ("this quarter") | First fully integrated QPUs received back from SkyWater; College Park testing begins | L014 |
Q2 2026 ("this quarter") | Break-even QEC demonstrated via QLDPC codes on Tempo test system | L016 |
June 22, 2026 | U.S. administration quantum executive orders issued | L023 |
"Last week" (relative to call date) | SkyWater acquisition closed (~$1.8B) | L017 |
1H 2027 (target) | 256-qubit system commissioning and manufacturing ramp target | L014, L055, L075 |
September 8, 2026 | Investor Day, New York Stock Exchange | L048, L094 |
Category Indices
Roman numerals below correspond to the fourteen indexing categories used throughout this document. Line references (L###) point to the numbered transcript in the final section.
I. Financial Results & Metrics
L007 Q2 2026 revenue $80.1M, +287% YoY, 5th consecutive record quarter
L027 Confirms $80.1M GAAP revenue, +287% YoY; beat internal expectations by 20%
L030 Organic revenue growth 132% YoY (Q2); FY organic growth guide reaffirmed at 100%
L032 Framework intro: geography, commercial mix, multi-product revenue metrics
L033 ~50% of Q2 revenue from international customers; 50+ countries served
L034 ~60% of Q2 revenue from commercial (non-U.S.-government) customers
L035 Multi-product sales +40% YoY; ~25% of Q2 revenue from multi-product customers
L036 RPO $485M (Q2), up from ~$470M (Q1) and ~$122M (year-ago quarter)
L037 GAAP opex $417.3M; non-GAAP opex $201.2M; non-GAAP R&D $160.6M
L038 Vertical integration expected to lower total qubit development cost over time
L039 Adjusted EBITDA -$120.3M; ~$20M higher SkyWater spend; ~$10M pre-integration costs
L040 GAAP net loss -$1.9B; ~$1.6B non-cash warrant mark-to-market impact [see Transcription Flags]
L042 FY2026 guidance raised to $280M-$290M revenue (IonQ standalone only)
L043 Reaffirms ~100% organic growth and ~100% platform growth expectations
L047 Confirms $0 of Argonne/Sandia MOU-related revenue currently in RPO
L070 Analyst question: $20M guidance raise vs. reiterated 100% organic growth
L071 Organic growth 132% vs. 100% guide; computing cited as largest growth driver
L072 Analyst question: SkyWater pre-close consensus revenue ~$610M
L073 SkyWater $120M IonQ spend forecast for FY2026; intercompany elimination mechanics explained
L077 Cumulative $3B invested across SkyWater + Oxford Ionics acquisitions
L088 Analyst question: 2H26 guidance implied at ~$135M-$145M
L089 Declines to split standalone Q3/Q4 IonQ figures; combined-company guidance deferred
L092 SkyWater deal structure: majority consideration paid in IonQ stock (stock-swap)
II. Guidance & Forward Outlook
L030 FY organic revenue growth guide: ~100% (reaffirmed)
L042 FY2026 revenue guidance raised to $280M-$290M (IonQ standalone)
L043 100% organic growth and 100% platform growth guidance reaffirmed
L055 256-qubit commissioning and manufacturing ramp targeted for 1H 2027
L014 256-qubit system commissioning plan targeted to begin in 2027
L073 Combined-company (IonQ + SkyWater) guidance to follow in coming weeks/~1 month
L089 Next quarter's guidance will reflect combined company; further detail expected at Sept. 8 Investor Day
III. Corporate Actions, M&A & Deal Structure
L008 SkyWater acquisition close referenced; platform now includes semiconductor manufacturing
L009 Three strategic pillars for the quarter, incl. SkyWater semiconductor roadmap
L012 Oxford Ionics acquisition closed (September 2025)
L014 First fully integrated QPUs received back from SkyWater; testing at College Park
L017 SkyWater acquisition closed (~$1.8B); creates vertically integrated full-stack platform
L018 Oxford Ionics + SkyWater technology integration loop closed (design-to-fab-to-chip)
L020 Nexus Photonics acquisition closed in Q2 2026 (UC Santa Barbara spinoff)
L024 SkyWater integration framed as de-risking/accelerating next-gen chip roadmap
L039 SkyWater-related spend increase (~$20M) and pre-integration costs (~$10M) in Adj. EBITDA
L041 SkyWater welcomed to IonQ; Tom (SkyWater leadership) referenced; separate SkyWater 10-Q pending
L042 Post-close guidance mechanics: ~$120M intercompany revenue/cost elimination
L055 SkyWater partnership timeline; 1H 2027 commissioning/manufacturing ramp target
L059 Analyst question: how the SkyWater foundry business model evolves post-acquisition
L060 Merchant-supplier positioning reaffirmed post-close; IP protection commitments
L061 SkyWater described as only operating quantum-dedicated foundry; 200mm price point
L072 Analyst question referencing pre-close SkyWater consensus revenue (~$610M)
L073 SkyWater integration financial mechanics; IonQ described as SkyWater's largest customer
L077 $3B cumulative investment across SkyWater + Oxford Ionics acquisitions
L090 Analyst question on SkyWater 256-qubit chip components (LightSync/Oxford Ionics sourcing)
L091 Confirms Boston-based photonics/memory IP base; SkyWater chip scaling roadmap
L092 Deal structure: majority stock consideration; SkyWater board reverse diligence; "one plus one equals thirty" framing
L094 Closing remarks reiterate SkyWater close and vertically integrated platform positioning
IV. Technology & Product Roadmap (Quantum Computing Hardware)
L010 Strategic shift from laser-based to electronic qubit control (announced ~1 year prior)
L011 Introduces milestone recap of electronic qubit control execution
L012 Oxford Ionics acquisition; Oct. 2025 world-record two-qubit gate fidelity (99.99%, no ground-state cooling)
L013 Feb. 2026: three tape-out rounds completed; May 2026: first chip prototypes received
L014 First fully integrated QPUs received from SkyWater; College Park testing; 256-qubit target 2027
L015 April 2026: fault-tolerant architecture paper released [name uncertain in audio; see Transcription Flags]
L016 Break-even QEC demonstrated via QLDPC codes on Tempo engineering test system
L018 Oxford Ionics electronic control + SkyWater fab integration - "closed the loop" on chip design-to-fab
L020 Nexus Photonics integration into next-gen atomic clocks/gravimeters; chip-scale photonics
L030 Tempo systems = current-year revenue driver; semiconductor-based computers = next-year driver
L038 Vertical integration expected to reduce cost per qubit over time
L053 Compiler/software maturity since 2020/2021 public cloud availability; chip scaling 256 -> 10,000 -> 100,000 -> 1,000,000 qubits
L054 Three chip generations in parallel development; program timeline Sept 2025-Aug 2026 recap
L064 Company technology history: first quantum logic gate (1995); "shovel-ready" fault-tolerant blueprint; ~6 systems across 3 offices
L065 Mass-market vision for quantum computing; sovereign and enterprise deployment model; DARPA HARQ program reference
L067 Full-stack revenue definition includes hardware + software applications; QCaaS offering
L075 Analyst question on 256-qubit commissioning (1H 2027) and path to 10,000 qubits
L076 Platform breadth claims: computing, security, networking, sensing all simultaneous priorities
L077 Fault-tolerant computing path via Gen 5/6/7 machine cadence; not a "5 years out" claim
L083 Quantum memory R&D center (Chattanooga); photon caching capability claimed as rare/unique
L090 256-qubit chip component question: Oxford Ionics microwave excitation sources vs. LightSync
L091 Boston photonics/memory IP base; path to millions of physical qubits per chip; 10,000-qubit chip tape-out beginning
V. Quantum Security & Cryptography (PQC / QKD / Q-Day)
L009 Third strategic pillar: quantum-safe cybersecurity stack / defense-in-depth
L021 "Q-Day" framing; RSA encryption threat timeline compressing; qubit count needed to break encryption down 4 orders of magnitude over 15 years
L022 Defense-in-depth stack; PQC as first step; QKD for longer-term resilience; new QKD product (municipal fiber, multi-data-type)
L048 Executive orders cover both quantum security and quantum computing/sensing/networking
L050 Security demand cited as rising alongside computing demand; Q-Day-driven customer interest
L056 Analyst question: government vs. enterprise post-EO security engagement mix
L057 RSA-2048 / ECC-256 vulnerability discussion; financial services urgency; PQC (software) + hardware-layer protection; AI-era PQC probing
L078 Analyst question: PQC "not provably safe" from quantum hacking; QKD momentum
L079 NIST PQC submission history (81 of 83 shown crackable within 90 days); QKD investment in Europe/Asia/China; AI-era PQC vulnerability
L080 Hybrid security world framing; quantum network vulnerability scanning service; anticipates future compliance mandates
L082 Analyst question: quantum memory center use for QKD vs. entanglement distribution
L091 Quantum memory role in extending secure QKD communications over long distances
VI. Government, Policy & Regulatory
L003 Reference to SEC website and earnings release filing
L005 Forward-looking statement disclaimer; reference to Form 10-K (FY2025) and Form 10-Q (Q2 2026)
L023 U.S. administration's June 22, 2026 quantum executive orders welcomed
L031 U.S. Space Development Agency "Halo Europa" contract [name uncertain; see Transcription Flags]
L041 SkyWater to file separate Form 10-Q for Q2 2026
L046 Analyst question referencing Argonne National Laboratory and Sandia National Laboratories MOUs
L048 Two executive orders described: (1) quantum security, (2) quantum computing/sensing/networking; Dept. of War applications referenced [as stated in source audio]
L056 Analyst question on government vs. enterprise engagement following executive orders
L057 Broad-based government/industry adoption dynamics post-EO
L063 DARPA Quantum Benchmarking Initiative (QBI) - Stage B status question
L064 Company declines to preempt DARPA announcements; DARPA program engagement affirmed
L065 DARPA HARQ program referenced as prior public disclosure
L076 Executive orders referenced again as validation of "quantum inflecting" narrative
L084 Senator Blackburn (TN) cited as supporter of National Quantum legislation and state initiatives
L086 Dr. Rick Mueller: former Sandia quantum program lead, former DARPA director, joined IonQ ~18 months prior; Sandia MOU (early/MOU stage)
L094 Closing remarks frame SkyWater/IonQ combination in national security and economic security terms
VII. Ecosystem, Customers & Strategic Partnerships
L019 Merchant-supplier model described: atomic clocks, sensors, networking products sold to other quantum companies
L020 Nexus Photonics positioned as merchant-supplier photonics foundry offering (via SkyWater)
L028 Customer deployments: KISTI (Korea) and Quantum Basel (Switzerland) - 5th-gen systems
L035 Multi-product cross-sell metric (quantum computing + quantum security bundling cited as example)
L046 Argonne National Laboratory and Sandia National Laboratories MOUs (status/next steps question)
L050 Customer bundling patterns: sensing/space, computing, security, networking
L059 SkyWater foundry - dual role supporting IonQ roadmap and broader quantum ecosystem
L061 SkyWater's role as sole operating quantum-dedicated foundry; future foundry capacity expectations
L068 Algorithm development team described as among largest in quantum industry; central + embedded sales deployment model
L082 Quantum communications research center; Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) relationship; Roadrunner system referenced
L083 Chattanooga R&D center near customer EPB; Vanderbilt University quantum campus
L084 EPB (Chattanooga utility/fiber customer) profile: fiber network history, energy-grid optimization work
L086 Sandia MOU status (early/MOU stage); Dr. Rick Mueller Sandia/DARPA background
VIII. Geography & International Markets
L028 Korea (KISTI) and Switzerland (Quantum Basel) - 5th-generation system deployments
L033 International revenue ~50% of Q2 total; named countries: Australia, South Korea, Portugal, India, Denmark, Germany, Israel, Japan; 50+ countries served overall
L057 Asia (QKD demand/presence) and United States security demand contrasted
L079 QKD investment activity: Europe, Asia (Korea), and China (ground- and space-based)
L083 Chattanooga, Tennessee - R&D center location; Vanderbilt University quantum campus
L084 Oak Ridge, Tennessee area talent/research ecosystem; EPB Chattanooga
L086 New Mexico (Sandia National Laboratories) - "Manhattan Project" analogy
L094 New York Stock Exchange - Investor Day location (Sept. 8, 2026)
IX. Space & Quantum Networking
L008 Quantum networking listed among core platform pillars
L019 Networking products (alongside atomic clocks/sensors) sold via merchant-supplier model
L020 Photonics integration supports progress toward data-center-scale distributed quantum networking
L031 84 SkyLoom optical communication terminals on orbit (2x YoY); Space Development Agency "Halo Europa" contract milestones
L050 Networking cited as "next" cross-sell layer after sensing/space and computing
L076 Quantum networking patents claimed as enabling distributed computing/entanglement; submarine-to-satellite domain coverage referenced
L079 Entanglement-distribution networking tied to security deployment expertise
L082 Quantum memory for QKD vs. entanglement distribution (research center question)
L091 Quantum memory/networking IP base (Boston); role in space and ground quantum data centers
X. Personnel & Leadership Directory
L001 Operator (call moderator)
L002 Hanley Dinofrio - Director of Investor Relations (introduces call)
L006 Handoff to Niccolo de Masi, Chairman and CEO
L007 Niccolo de Masi - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer (delivers opening remarks, L007-L026)
L026 Handoff to Inder Singh
L027 Inder Singh - Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer (delivers financial results, L027-L044)
L041 "Tom" - SkyWater leadership referenced (surname not stated in source audio)
L046 Kevin Garrigan - Analyst, Jefferies (Q&A: L046, L049)
L052 Frank Gallus - Analyst, B. Riley Securities [name/firm uncertain; see Transcription Flags] (Q&A: L052, L056)
L058 Quinn Bolton - Analyst, Needham and Company (unable to ask question due to audio issue)
L059 Alice Polchinski - Analyst, on for Joe Moore, Morgan Stanley (Q&A: L059)
L063 Troy Jensen - Analyst, Cantor Fitzgerald (Q&A: L063, L066)
L070 Gary Mobley - Analyst, StoneX (Q&A: L070, L072)
L075 John McPeak - Analyst, Rosenblatt Securities (Q&A: L075, L078)
L082 Tyler Anderson - Analyst, on for "Richard" [surname uncertain], Craig-Hallum (Q&A: L082, L085)
L086 Dr. Rick Mueller - IonQ personnel; former Sandia quantum program lead; former DARPA director; joined IonQ ~18 months before this call
L084 Senator Marsha Blackburn (TN) - referenced as National Quantum bill supporter [not a call participant]
L088 Unnamed analyst - Northland Capital Markets [name transcribed as "Nahal Chotski"; unconfirmed] (Q&A: L088, L090)
XI. Competitive Positioning & Market Leadership Claims
L009 Framing as industry leader across three strategic pillars
L017 Claim: only vertically integrated, full-stack quantum platform company
L019 Claim: world's largest quantum merchant supplier
L024 Claim: clear technology leader, critical merchant supplier, vital ecosystem enabler
L029 Claim: unmatched innovation velocity/pace of multi-system global delivery
L048 Claim: only company embodying both executive orders' totality
L061 Claim: SkyWater is the only currently operating quantum-dedicated foundry
L064 Claim: built world's first quantum logic gate (1995); first "shovel-ready" fault-tolerant blueprint
L068 Claim: one of the largest (possibly largest) algorithm development teams in quantum
L076 Claim: ~50% of public-sector quantum industry revenue; majority of sector R&D spend
L079 Claim: largest player in QKD; only company offering full defense-in-depth quantum security
L083 Claim: one of very few (possibly only) companies able to cache photons for photonics applications
L092 Claim/framing: "one plus one equals thirty" - SkyWater board's diligence conclusion on combination value
XII. Risk Factors, Disclaimers & Forward-Looking Statements
L004 Non-GAAP financial measures disclaimer
L005 Forward-looking statements disclaimer; risk factors; 10-K/10-Q references; no obligation to update
L040 Net income volatility disclaimer tied to warrant valuations
L043 Acknowledgment of execution risk; company states focus on risk mitigation
L089 Caution against reading standalone-quarter guidance choice as a signal of slowing trajectory
XIII. Analyst Directory (Full Q&A Threads by Firm)
L046 KEVIN GARRIGAN — Jefferies | Q1 L046 (Argonne/Sandia MOU status, RPO inclusion) -> A: L047 Inder Singh, L048 Niccolo de Masi | Q2 L049 (multi-product bundling) -> A: L050 Inder Singh
L052 FRANK GALLUS — B. Riley Securities [name/firm uncertain, see Section XVII] | Operator intro L051 | Q1 L052 (systems-test-to-commissioning roadmap) -> A: L053-L055 Niccolo de Masi | Q2 L056 (govt vs. enterprise EO engagement) -> A: L057 Niccolo de Masi
L058 QUINN BOLTON — Needham and Company | L058: unable to ask question due to audio/connection issue; operator moved on. No question captured in this transcript.
L059 ALICE POLCHINSKI (on for Joe Moore) — Morgan Stanley | Q1 L059 (SkyWater foundry business model evolution, competitive positioning) -> A: L060-L061 Niccolo de Masi | No follow-up recorded
L063 TROY JENSEN — Cantor Fitzgerald | Operator intro L062 | Q1 L063 (DARPA QBI Stage B update) -> A: L064-L065 Niccolo de Masi | Q2 L066 (software IP ownership model) -> A: L067 Niccolo de Masi, L068 Inder Singh
L070 GARY MOBLEY — StoneX | Operator intro L069 | Q1 L070 (guidance raise reconciliation vs. 100% organic guide) -> A: L071 Inder Singh | Q2 L072 (SkyWater standalone revenue trend, ~$610M consensus) -> A: L073 Inder Singh
L075 JOHN MCPEAK — Rosenblatt Securities | Operator intro L074 | Q1 L075 (new-customer interest given 256-qubit/10,000-qubit roadmap) -> A: L076 Niccolo de Masi, L077 Inder Singh | Q2 L078 (PQC durability / QKD momentum) -> A: L079-L080 Niccolo de Masi
L082 TYLER ANDERSON (on for "Richard", surname uncertain) — Craig-Hallum | Operator intro L081 | Q1 L082 (quantum memory center use-case, Sandia relationship) -> A: L083-L084 Inder Singh | Q2 L085 (Sandia specifics) -> A: L086 Niccolo de Masi
L087 UNNAMED ANALYST (name transcribed "Nahal Chotski", unconfirmed) — Northland Capital Markets | Operator intro L087 | Q1 L088 (2H26 guidance distribution ~$135M-$145M) -> A: L089 Inder Singh | Q2 L090 (256-qubit chip component sourcing / LightSync) -> A: L091-L092 Niccolo de Masi
XIV. Forward-Looking Statements & Guidance Index
L005 [Safe-Harbor Anchor] Formal forward-looking-statement disclaimer; 10-K/10-Q references; no duty to update
L009 [Directional] "Accelerate the timeline for full fault-tolerant quantum computing"
L014 [Roadmap/Target] Plan to begin commissioning 256-qubit systems in 2027
L015 [Roadmap/Target] Fault-tolerant architecture "will scale with us as we grow...to millions of qubits"
L020 [Roadmap/Target] Plan to supply integrated photonics components via SkyWater foundry offering
L021 [Roadmap/Target] Accelerating path to 10,000 qubits in 2027
L022 [Directional] Long-term security resilience "will increasingly rely" on QKD
L030 [Guidance] Next year: semiconductor-based computers expected to become main revenue driver
L034 [Directional] Government revenue mix expected to grow over time
L037 [Directional] "Preparing to do even more next year" on manufacturing ramp
L038 [Directional] Vertical integration expected to lower development costs "over time"
L041 [Administrative] SkyWater 10-Q expected "in the coming days"
L042 [Guidance Figure] FY2026 revenue guidance raised to $280M-$290M (IonQ standalone)
L043 [Guidance Figure] ~100% organic growth and ~100% platform growth reaffirmed for FY2026
L055 [Roadmap/Target] "Remain on track" to begin commissioning/deploying systems in 1H next year
L061 [Directional/Opinion] Expectation of additional quantum foundries entering the sector "over time"
L065 [Administrative] Commitment to update market following future DARPA announcements
L071 [Directional] Expected growth continuation across security, networking, sensing product lines
L073 [Administrative] Commitment to return with intercompany-elimination detail within weeks to a month
L076 [Directional] "We intend to keep our foot on the gas" on investment pace
L077 [Roadmap/Target] Explicit multi-year cadence: Gen 5 (now), Gen 6 (next year), Gen 7 (year after), concurrent FTQC delivery
L080 [Speculative] Anticipated future compliance mandates for quantum-attack network security
L083 [Directional] Quantum memory framed as "multi-generation product investment"
L089 [Guidance/Administrative] Combined-company (IonQ + SkyWater) guidance to begin next quarter
L091 [Roadmap/Target] Belief in ultimate path to millions of physical qubits per chip
L092 [Directional] Expectation of "more acceleration further out on the roadmap" from combined entity
L094 [Administrative] Forward reference to September 8, 2026 Investor Day
XV. Investor Presentation Slide / Page Cross-Reference
L008 Slide 4 - Platform momentum overview (computing, networking, security, sensing)
L011 Slide 5 - Electronic qubit control milestone recap intro
L015 Slide 6 - Fault-tolerant architecture / control software and system architecture
L017 Slide 7 - SkyWater transformational combination overview
L019 Slide 8 - Merchant supplier role expansion
L021 Slide 9 - Quantum security and "Q-Day" positioning
L022 Slide 10 - Defense-in-depth quantum-safe cybersecurity stack
L027 Page 12 (investor presentation) - Start of detailed financial results section
XVI. Named Entities & Organizations Index
L012 Oxford Ionics (subsidiary; also L018, L053, L054, L077, L090)
L017 SkyWater Technology (subsidiary post-close; referenced extensively L008-L094)
L020 Nexus Photonics / UC Santa Barbara (acquisition)
L028 KISTI - Korea Institute of Science and Technology Information (customer)
L028 Quantum Basel (customer, Switzerland)
L031 U.S. Space Development Agency (government customer/contract)
L014 College Park (IonQ facility - QPU testing)
L046 Argonne National Laboratory (MOU counterparty)
L046 Sandia National Laboratories (MOU counterparty; also L082, L085, L086)
L048 White House / Dept. of War [as stated] (executive order source / application context)
L063 DARPA (also L064, L065, L086) - QBI and HARQ programs
L079 NIST (PQC standardization body)
L083 Vanderbilt University (Chattanooga quantum campus)
L083 EPB - Chattanooga utility/fiber customer (also L084)
L084 Senator Marsha Blackburn (TN) - National Quantum bill support
L086 New Mexico (Sandia location / "Manhattan Project" analogy)
L091 Boston, MA - IonQ photonics/quantum memory office
L094 New York Stock Exchange - Investor Day venue
L045 Jefferies (analyst firm)
L051 B. Riley Securities (analyst firm) [name uncertain]
L058 Needham and Company (analyst firm)
L058 Morgan Stanley (analyst firm)
L062 Cantor Fitzgerald (analyst firm)
L069 StoneX (analyst firm)
L074 Rosenblatt Securities (analyst firm)
L081 Craig-Hallum (analyst firm)
L087 Northland Capital Markets (analyst firm)
XVII. Transcription Uncertainty Flags (Verify Before Citing)
L015 "Walking cat architecture" - fault-tolerant architecture paper name unclear in source audio
L031 "Halo Europa" - Space Development Agency contract name as heard, unconfirmed
L040 "$16 billion" warrant mark-to-market figure in source audio corrected to ~$1.6B for internal consistency with stated $1.9B net loss
L046 "Androl and San Diego" corrected to "Argonne and Sandia" based on context
L048 "Department of War" as stated in source audio [terminology as heard, not independently verified]
L051 Analyst name/firm uncertain: heard variously as "Gallus," "B. Raleigh's," "Frank Gillis"; rendered as Frank Gallus, B. Riley Securities
L081 Analyst's colleague "Richard" - surname not clearly captured in source audio
L086 "IRPA" heard in source audio for Dr. Rick Mueller's prior role; rendered as DARPA based on context
L087 Analyst name transcribed as "Nahal Chotski" - spelling unconfirmed
L088 Second-half guidance figures ("$135 million to $145 million") as stated by analyst in source audio; not independently re-derived here
L090 "LightSync" technology reference - possibly "Lightsynq"; spelling unconfirmed
Full Line-Numbered Transcript
Call Participants: Hanley Dinofrio (Director of Investor Relations) · Niccolo de Masi (Chairman and CEO) · Inder Singh (COO and CFO)
L001 OPERATOR
Good afternoon, and welcome to the IonQ second quarter 2026 earnings call. [Operator instructions.] Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Hanley Dinofrio, Director of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.
L002 HANLEY DINOFRIO (Director of Investor Relations)
Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to IonQ's second quarter 2026 earnings call. My name is Hanley Dinofrio, and I'm the Investor Relations Director here at IonQ. I'm pleased to be joined on today's call by Niccolo de Masi, IonQ's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, and Inder Singh, IonQ's Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer.
L003
By now, everyone should have access to the company's second quarter 2026 earnings release issued this afternoon, which is available on the SEC's website and on the Investor Relations section of our website at investors.ionq.com.
L004
Please note that on today's call, management will refer to non-GAAP financial measures. While the company believes these non-GAAP financial measures provide useful information for investors, this information is not intended to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for financial information presented in accordance with GAAP. We direct you to our earnings release for a reconciliation of adjusted EBITDA and adjusted EPS to the closest comparable GAAP measures.
L005
During the call, we will discuss our business outlook and make forward-looking statements, including those regarding our guidance for 2026. These comments are based on our predictions and expectations as of today and are not guarantees of future performance. Actual events or results could differ materially due to a number of risks and uncertainties. Therefore, you should not place undue reliance on those statements. We refer you to our SEC filings, including our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2025, and our Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended June 30, 2026, for a more detailed discussion of those risks and uncertainties. We undertake no obligation to revise any statements to reflect changes that occur after this call, except as required by law.
L006
Now I will turn it over to Niccolo de Masi, Chairman and CEO of IonQ.
L007 NICCOLO DE MASI (Chairman and Chief Executive Officer)
Thank you all for joining us today. I am pleased to report that IonQ delivered second quarter revenue of $80.1 million, representing 287% year-on-year growth. This makes Q2 2026 the strongest quarter in IonQ's history, and our fifth consecutive quarter of record results.
L008
As shown on slide 4 of this quarter's investor presentation, this performance reflects momentum across our entire quantum platform, spanning quantum computing, quantum networking, quantum security, and quantum sensing. Following the successful close of our acquisition of SkyWater, our platform now also includes quantum semiconductor manufacturing. Inder will take you through the financial results and outlook in more detail.
L009
I want to center my remarks today on three key areas defining our progress. First, manufacturing our industry-leading quantum systems on a semiconductor roadmap with SkyWater. Second, expanding our role as a merchant supplier to the U.S. and allied quantum ecosystem. And third, delivering defense-in-depth via a complete quantum-safe cybersecurity stack, as we accelerate the timeline for full fault-tolerant quantum computing.
L010
Beginning with our quantum computing achievements and the production of quantum systems with semiconductor manufacturing: one year ago, we announced that IonQ would move our pioneering and commercially successful trapped-ion architecture from laser-based control to electronic qubit control. This is a globally unique and powerful controller approach, allowing us to rapidly scale our trapped-ion systems into the millions of qubits using well-established semiconductor pathways. For our customers, electronic control facilitates more seamless standard enterprise workflows while delivering the lowest cost and lowest energy footprint per logical qubit on the market.
L011
IonQ has been consistently executing against this major initiative over the past year. Let me recap that progress, because the pace has been extraordinary. For those following along in our investor presentation, please see slide 5.
L012
Last September, we closed our acquisition of Oxford Ionics, bringing the pioneers of electronic qubit control into IonQ. In October last year, we published results setting a new world record in two-qubit gate fidelities, demonstrating 99.99% fidelity without ground-state cooling. These results proved that electronic qubit control enables world-leading performance via a scalable, production-ready semiconductor manufacturing process.
L013
In February 2026, we announced that we had progressed through three rounds of tape-outs for our first semiconductor-based quantum chip, and were preparing to hand those designs to the foundry for production. In May 2026, we reported that we had received our first chip prototypes back. These prototypes demonstrated the critical quality metrics required for our production-grade 256-qubit chips, while also approaching those required for our 10,000-qubit chips. Each milestone has reduced execution risk and positioned IonQ to create value for our customers and shareholders.
L014
I am proud to report that this quarter we received our first fully featured, fully integrated QPUs back from SkyWater, and they are now undergoing testing at our College Park facility. These chips consolidate all the individual capabilities validated over the last few months of prototyping into a single, unified chip architecture. Having a full QPU prototype like this is what enables us to start testing integrated systems. These QPUs represent a pivotal milestone in our compute roadmap, and a powerful testament to what IonQ and SkyWater can achieve together. We have moved with conviction to demonstrate our 256-qubit technology and plan to begin commissioning systems in 2027.
L015
We are also advancing our control software and system architecture. For those following along, please turn to slide 6. In April of this year, we released our fault-tolerant architecture paper [transcribed as "walking cat architecture" — name unclear in source audio, likely a mishearing of the paper's actual title], which is the industry's first end-to-end, detailed, manufacturable blueprint of a fault-tolerant quantum computer. This paper shows how fault-tolerant IonQ systems will execute operations while actively correcting errors. Importantly, this is an architecture that will scale with us as we grow our systems to millions of qubits.
L016
This quarter, we validated key elements of that architecture on our hardware. IonQ achieved a major milestone by demonstrating break-even quantum error correction using QLDPC codes on a Tempo engineering test system. Our published results this quarter are a major validation of our quantum error correction capabilities, which IonQ is proud to continue pioneering. These technical accomplishments demonstrate IonQ's industry-leading position, rapid commercial advancement, and tangible value-creation potential.
L017
Now let me turn to SkyWater, and IonQ's expanding role as a merchant supplier to the U.S. and allied quantum ecosystem. Last week, we closed our $1.8 billion acquisition of SkyWater, creating the only vertically integrated, full-stack quantum platform company. Together, IonQ and SkyWater own the design, fabrication, packaging, and deployment of our systems, entirely onshore, entirely in trusted U.S. facilities. As seen on slide 7, this is a transformational combination that enables IonQ to materially accelerate our quantum computing roadmap and our ability to design, test, and iterate on QPUs at speed.
L018
Oxford Ionics brought us proprietary, industry-leading electronic qubit control technology to scale qubit counts on standard silicon. SkyWater brings a world-class semiconductor foundry under our own roof to fabricate those designs. This past quarter, we closed the loop: QPUs designed with electronic qubit control, built at SkyWater, and returned to us as our first fully featured chips. IonQ and SkyWater have together carried a design from concept to fabrication — proof that our strategy is translating into results.
L019
As you can see on slide 8, with SkyWater we're also pleased to expand our role as a leading merchant supplier to the broader quantum ecosystem. Even before the acquisition, IonQ served as an important merchant supplier, with our industry-leading atomic clocks, sensors, and networking products being sold to other leading quantum companies. With SkyWater's semiconductor technology supporting multiple QPU modalities, IonQ is now the world's largest quantum merchant supplier, delivering the critical technologies every quantum company needs. Our goal is to accelerate all quantum companies working with us — ions, atoms, superconductors, photonics, sensors, and networks.
L020
I'm also pleased to share that we further expanded our merchant supplier capabilities in Q2 through our acquisition of Nexus Photonics, a UC Santa Barbara spinoff. Nexus brings foundational technologies that enable chip-scale integration of lasers, modulators, and optical subsystems, supporting miniaturization and mass manufacture of quantum systems. We have already begun integrating these solutions into our next-generation atomic clocks and gravimeters. For quantum networking, these integrated photonics capabilities move us closer to data-center-scale distributed quantum systems. We plan to supply these critical integrated components to the broader quantum ecosystem as part of the industry's first dedicated quantum photonics foundry offering at SkyWater. As the cornerstone quantum merchant supplier across the U.S. and allied landscape, we have procedures in place to protect our customers' IP and can assure our customers of a partnership focused on accelerating their roadmaps.
L021
Turning to slide 9, I want to address quantum security and "Q-Day" — a topic rapidly moving to the forefront of boardrooms and defense agencies around the world. Quantum computing is a paradigm shift, not only for every aspect of applied science, but also for cybersecurity. As I forecast a year ago, the timeline for cryptographically relevant machines that threaten RSA encryption is rapidly compressing. Over the past 15 years, the estimated number of qubits needed to break encryption has dropped by four orders of magnitude. Simultaneously, IonQ is accelerating our path to 10,000 qubits in 2027, positioning us at the forefront of this security reality.
L022
As you can see on slide 10, IonQ uniquely provides defense-in-depth via our complete quantum-safe cybersecurity stack. Post-quantum cryptography is a critical first step in protecting existing infrastructure at scale. Longer-term resilience, however, will increasingly rely on advanced quantum communications technologies, including quantum key distribution (QKD). To meet those needs, this quarter we launched a new QKD product that allows customers to send multiple data types across existing municipal fiber networks, making enterprise-grade quantum security practical, deployable, and cheaper to operate.
L023
We welcome the U.S. administration's June 22nd quantum executive orders, which recognize that quantum technologies are inflecting. Quantum leadership is emerging as the defining technological competition of not only our lifetimes, but I expect of the 21st century itself.
L024
We enter the second half of this year as a clear technology leader, critical merchant supplier, and vital ecosystem enabler for the entire quantum industry. With SkyWater now part of IonQ, we are de-risking and accelerating multiple engineering pathways for our next-generation quantum chips. In parallel, we are also helping to create the manufacturing and supply-chain foundation required to accelerate and scale the entire U.S. and allied quantum industry.
L025
In closing, our conviction is that quantum, like classical computing before it, ultimately scales on a semiconductor foundation. That is why we have built a manufacturable, silicon-based platform, and why we are increasingly focused on the measures that determine real-world value: cost and energy per logical qubit, and the cost and time to solution. Those are the metrics that allow quantum computing to serve industry and government dependably at scale. Around all of this sits an interoperable software and enablement stack, with an access strategy that spans on-premise deployments and every major public cloud. This is what a defined industry looks like.
L026
I'm now delighted to hand the call over to Inder.
L027 INDER SINGH (Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer)
Thank you very much, Niccolo. I'm very excited to be reporting our strongest quarter ever in the history of the company. As Niccolo said, we delivered $80.1 million in GAAP revenue, representing 287% growth year on year. Not only was it our strongest quarter ever, it also exceeded our own expectations by 20%. We continue to be pleased by our progress in the market, and that is being validated by the financial outcomes we are reporting to you today. You can also see some of this in our investor presentation starting on page 12.
L028
The largest driver of our revenue outperformance this quarter was the continued momentum of deploying our fifth-generation quantum computing systems. This quarter, we began shipments of subsystems to the Korea Institute of Science and Technology Information (KISTI), and those systems are currently being delivered and assembled in Korea at the customer site. Similarly, with Quantum Basel in Switzerland, our fifth-generation machine is now in final assembly on-site, right next to the fourth-generation machine they had previously purchased from us. I believe this represents the world's first deployment of two consecutive generations of quantum computers next to each other in a commercial setting.
L029
Recall that we had told you previously we were ramping production to do exactly this — deliver multiple global systems at once, at scale. The bottom line is that we continue to innovate in ways no one else has, and at a velocity we believe is incomparable.
L030
On the organic growth side, our Q2 organic revenue grew 132% year on year, based on these global quantum computer deployments and others. I would remind you that for the full year we are still expecting organic revenue to grow 100%, as we guided at the start of the year. I'm delighted to see the acceleration this quarter showing the strength of that business. This year, Tempo quantum computing revenue is the principal driver, and next year we expect our semiconductor-based computers, as Niccolo mentioned, to become the main driver as we transition from laser-based to electronic-based control of qubits.
L031
We also made excellent progress across our space-based products. We now have 84 SkyLoom optical communication terminals deployed on orbit, double the number from a year ago. We also began work during the quarter for the U.S. Space Development Agency, under a "Halo Europa" contract [name as heard in source audio], completing key design milestones on the path to delivering functioning satellites into orbit to support a multimodal constellation primed for quantum solutions.
L032
As we've done in recent quarters, let me provide some metrics related to the drivers of our revenue — around geography, commercial mix, and multi-product sales. We share these in the spirit of transparency, though they can vary quarter to quarter.
L033
On geography: approximately 50% of our revenue in the quarter was derived from international customers, spanning countries such as Australia, South Korea, Portugal, India, Denmark, Germany, Israel, and Japan, to name a few. This quarter was especially strong on the international metric due to our quantum computing deployments in Korea and Switzerland. We are delivering solutions in over 50 countries around the world, and our inbound pipeline continues to grow, though we won't convert all of that into customers — pipelines are large and require effort, and we remain focused on our best investments for the best ROI.
L034
The second revenue metric is commercial mix. In the quarter, we again saw 60% of our revenue come from commercial — meaning non-U.S.-government — customers. This tells us our customers are putting our solutions to work in real-world applications, not just funding research. We do expect government to grow over time, which could skew this metric toward government in any given quarter — something we would happily take.
L035
Third, we continue to be excited about the multi-product dimension of our revenue, and we believe there's a lot more we can do here. One obvious example is driving combined sales of quantum computing and quantum security, which we're seeing in high demand. On a year-on-year basis, our multi-product sales grew by 40% and now represent approximately 25% of this quarter's revenue. This represents strong growth, and we remain focused on driving that cross-sell opportunity even higher.
L036
Let me now discuss our remaining performance obligations (RPO), a widely used measure of forward revenue visibility. We ended Q2 with $485 million in reported RPO, up from approximately $470 million last quarter, and up from approximately $122 million one year ago. This is notable given that we had one of our strongest quarters, drawing down RPO into revenue and replenishing it, and then some. RPO can vary quarter to quarter, but at any point in time it provides visibility into revenue that will be recognized over more than one year, and it remains a focus area for us as we continue to grow it.
L037
Turning to operating expenses: GAAP operating expenses for the quarter were $417.3 million, or $201.2 million on a non-GAAP basis. Our largest area of opex continues to be R&D, as we pioneer this transformational technology and fuel our innovation engine — $160.6 million of non-GAAP opex consisted of R&D. In addition to R&D, as we told you last quarter, we're also investing in go-to-market resources as enterprise-wide opportunities continue to emerge. Overall, our investment approach is to focus on execution and creating operating leverage over time by ramping our manufacturing to meet demand — an effort SkyWater will help us with further. We are already delivering multiple global compute systems simultaneously, and we're preparing to do even more next year. Moving forward, we'll continue to strengthen operations by optimizing our supply chain and consolidating operations across the company, while maintaining tight discipline on quantum investment areas.
L038
Through vertical integration with SkyWater, we expect to be able to lower IonQ's total development costs for quantum hardware over time, delivering industry-leading cost per qubit and creating a further structural cost advantage. Our focus on long-term investment allows us to attract industry-leading talent density, create innovation velocity, and drive operating performance. Our capital strength also allows us to invest for the long term, which is essential even as we execute quarter to quarter.
L039
Moving to adjusted EBITDA: we reported negative $120.3 million in the second quarter. As we reported last quarter, our spending with SkyWater increased as we found success accelerating our technology roadmap; this quarter, that higher spend resulted in approximately $20 million of additional spending included in that number. Additionally, we had approximately $10 million of higher investment related to pre-integration costs, both in anticipation of SkyWater's close and in securing our supply chain.
L040
As most of you already know, our net income is volatile from quarter to quarter and depends heavily on warrant valuations. We reported a GAAP net loss of negative $1.9 billion for the second quarter, primarily due to a roughly $1.6 billion non-cash impact from the mark-to-market valuation of warrants, as required by accounting conventions [figure transcribed in source audio as "$16 billion," which is inconsistent with the stated $1.9 billion total net loss and is almost certainly a transcription error for approximately $1.6 billion]. Needless to say, this accounting impact does not reflect operating fundamentals.
L041
We are very excited to welcome SkyWater to IonQ. I'm pleased to welcome Tom and his team as we execute on our world-leading technology roadmap together for our customers. As a reminder, because IonQ and SkyWater operated as separate public companies throughout the second quarter, today's results and any guidance we provide include only IonQ's financials. SkyWater is expected to file its own 10-Q for the second quarter in the coming days.
L042
Now turning to guidance: we had a tremendous quarter, outperforming even our own expectations, and we are raising our full-year guidance for IonQ to a range of $280 million to $290 million in revenue. This guidance range applies only to IonQ, as we have operated as a combined company for less than a week and need to integrate our operations before providing combined-company revenue or EBITDA guidance. A number of items will need to be worked through — for example, we estimate that our full-year spending with SkyWater under our commercial agreement would have been approximately $120 million, converting into revenue for them in fiscal year 2026. Following the close, we will be looking at eliminating this intercompany revenue and related costs. There are additional accounting adjustments required as our companies merge, including purchase price accounting treatment and certain contract considerations. We will come back to you with combined guidance in due course, but for today we are speaking principally about IonQ on a standalone basis.
L043
In summary, we delivered a fantastic quarter of phenomenal growth, and we could not be more bullish on the long-term potential of our company. We recognize that, as with any company, execution is always key, and there are always risks we must work to mitigate — we remain laser-focused on ensuring we do that. We continue to expect approximately 100% growth in our organic business, and 100% growth in our quantum platform strategy as well.
L044
With that, I'd like to turn the call over to the operator for Q&A.
L045 OPERATOR
We will now begin the question-and-answer session. [Operator instructions: press star then one to ask a question; star then two to withdraw.] Please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. We will now pause momentarily to assemble the roster. Our first question comes from Kevin Garrigan with Jefferies.
L046 KEVIN GARRIGAN (Jefferies)
Hey team, congrats on the great results. Just to start, regarding the Argonne and Sandia [transcribed as "Androl and San Diego" — corrected based on context of national-lab MOUs] MOUs, what are the next steps for converting these into development contracts or system deployments? And are there any dollars currently included in RPO or the 2026 revenue outlook from these?
L047 INDER SINGH
I'll take the second part first. There are no dollars included in RPO from future business coming from those relationships. We are incredibly excited about them — they bring together the best of our quantum solutions with the solutions of those labs. We think there's a lot of potential going forward, but no, we have not included anything in RPO for what we might get from them.
L048 NICCOLO DE MASI
All I would add is that the White House has issued two important executive orders — one on quantum security, and one on quantum computing, sensing, and networking. Taken together, it's a great reflection of IonQ's total platform strategy. I think we're the only quantum company — probably the only company — that can say we embody all aspects of both executive orders in their totality. These MOUs are very much a recognition of the fact that we have a lot to bring to bear to help not just our nation's government labs, some of the most historic and important ones out there, but also to support a range of applications for the Department of War [as stated], which we haven't fully enumerated, both due to the confidentiality involved and because, as Inder rightly noted, this is still early-stage and not yet in our numbers. We'll report more as it develops. We also have an Investor Day coming up on September 8th.
L049 KEVIN GARRIGAN
Got it, perfect, thank you. And as a follow-up — of the 25% of customers now utilizing multiple products, what products are most frequently bundled together, and are those engagements generating larger contracts or higher renewals?
L050 INDER SINGH
I think they're creating a stickiness environment for us, most importantly — having a one-stop shop where customers can come and get what they need now, and then what they need next. That's a good validator, one Niccolo and I have both seen across the dozen-plus companies we've collectively been part of. The most natural groupings we're seeing are in the sensing-and-space environment, and also demand for computing — which continues to be, I'll use the word, "en fuego" for us — is now also causing more companies, especially given the recent executive order around preparing for a post-quantum "Q-Day" environment, to focus more on security. More customers are talking about security, and in many cases they're also asking about our computing use cases. Networking comes in as the next connective layer, and I think it's a matter of time before we see sensing follow a similar pathway. We're happy to have multiple large addressable markets available to us, with some of the world's leading products in each, allowing our sales team to take a land-and-expand approach that meets the customer where they are.
L051 OPERATOR
Our next question comes from Frank Gallus with B. Riley Securities. [Note: name as heard in source audio — transcribed variously as "Gallus," "B. Raleigh's," and "Frank Gillis"; two analysts appear to have been on the line together per the speaker's own comment.]
L052 FRANK GALLUS (B. Riley Securities)
Congratulations on closing the SkyWater deal, and congratulations to Tom and his team. My first question is a follow-up on the roadmap comments — I want to understand in greater detail what you're hoping to accomplish with the "end progress" [as heard] systems test. What are the key milestones you want to check off? And as we look at customer commissioning in the first half of next year, can you help us understand the key steps from system test to customer commissioning?
L053 NICCOLO DE MASI
Sure. IonQ has had systems in the marketplace running applications for the better part of a decade — we've been on all three public clouds since 2020/early 2021, so we're no stranger to moving from prototypes to systems. We already have a working compiler, we know how to run algorithms, and we have a full-stack software and controls team. The key shift for us, from Tempo — where we've been building machines the last few years — to today's Oxford Ionics and SkyWater electronic qubit control, is that we're putting ion traps on a semiconductor chip, and scaling from 256 qubits to 10,000, and eventually higher — 100,000, and a million — in coming generations.
L054
We're working on at least three generations of chips in parallel. We're making progress on the 10,000-qubit chip at the same time as we've taped out and nearly finalized prototypes of the 256-qubit chip. Beyond the chip itself, there's the enclosure and the rest of a fully commissioned system. The chip was the hard part, candidly, which is why we've provided granularity over the last six to nine months — from closing Oxford Ionics last September, to our February call, to our May call, and now this call. We feel great about the translation of our roughly 30-year R&D base — building and selling full systems in the marketplace — into a shift from bulk optics and lasers to a semiconductor-based, electronic qubit control system.
L055
SkyWater has been a great commercial partner over the last year, and we expect that closing this transaction will accelerate not just IonQ but the entire industry. You'll get updates from us every earnings call, and between calls as warranted by Reg FD-compliant events. The bulk of the challenge is now behind us — once we have chip prototypes coming off the line, the rest is a solved problem for us, one we've executed for many years. We remain on track to begin commissioning and deploying systems, and ramping manufacturing lines, in the first half of next year.
L056 FRANK GALLUS
That's helpful. Follow-up for Inder — on the executive orders: our checks suggest government agencies have been very active in accelerating engagement with quantum entities, and you have the broadest platform in the market with relevant capabilities. Is the post-executive-order engagement you're seeing mostly from government entities, or also enterprise customers, and to what extent does one outweigh the other?
L057 NICCOLO DE MASI
The nation broadly is moving to adopt and implement not just the spirit of the executive orders but to get there earlier. There's a realization now — that didn't exist a year or year-and-a-half ago — that the evolution of quantum computing will be this rapid, with each generation exponentially more powerful than the last, so the sense of urgency is rising. That's happening not only in government but importantly in data-heavy industries — financial services, for instance, is waking up to the reality that RSA-2048 and other encryption protocols such as ECC-256 may eventually be broken, with debate centered on the timeline rather than the "if." The nation is also thinking about adversaries pursuing the same capability. A year ago, conversations with CEOs were about computing; now security enters every discussion — both "how can I create more revenue with quantum" and "how do you protect me from the inevitable." This is broad-based, and especially evident in parts of Asia where we already have a strong QKD presence, but we're now also seeing meaningful demand from the United States. There's growing understanding that protection is needed at both the software level (PQC) and the hardware level, to secure data in motion end-to-end in a post-quantum world. Data-intensive industries in particular are recognizing they need to prepare for something unprecedented — and frankly, current AI capabilities are already probing the limits of PQC algorithms and showing some may not be as durable as assumed even a few weeks ago.
L058 OPERATOR
Our next question comes from Quinn Bolton with Needham and Company. [Mr. Bolton experienced audio/connection difficulties; the operator moved to the next question and indicated Mr. Bolton would be returned to later in the queue.] Our next question comes from Joe Moore with Morgan Stanley.
L059 ALICE POLCHINSKI (on for Joe Moore, Morgan Stanley)
Thank you for taking our question. Now that SkyWater is part of IonQ, can you talk about how you see the foundry business evolving over time? Do you expect it to operate mainly in support of IonQ's own roadmap, to serve the broader quantum ecosystem, or both? And how do you think about SkyWater's competitive positioning as more companies invest in quantum-focused manufacturing capabilities?
L060 NICCOLO DE MASI
We've been clear since announcing this transaction in January, and remain clear today, that we are a merchant supplier — the leading merchant supplier to the sector — and intend to continue in that posture. We're very focused on ensuring maximal IP protection for all customers; SkyWater has a strong track record on this, having operated as the only quantum-dedicated foundry in the United States for several years. On a go-forward basis, "merchant supplier" means we support the industry with the highest degree of physical and digital IP protection and security. We sell our atomic clocks, integrated photonics, quantum networking solutions, and now quantum foundry solutions, all under the SkyWater merchant-supplier umbrella — this won't change; it's a key part of our commitment to our industry and our nation, for both national security and national economic security reasons.
L061
On competitive positioning: SkyWater is currently the only quantum-dedicated foundry operating today, and it operates at a price point in the 200-millimeter segment that we believe will remain compelling for the foreseeable future. We have no doubt the sector will need more quantum foundries over time, but building new foundries takes time, and SkyWater has been at this for roughly a decade. We expect to stay very busy supporting both IonQ's own integrated ambitions and every other player in the sector — across superconducting, photonic, ion, and atomic modalities — who works with us today or wants to begin working with us; we're finding strong receptivity across the board.
L062 OPERATOR
Our next question comes from Troy Jensen with Cantor Fitzgerald.
L063 TROY JENSEN (Cantor Fitzgerald)
Congrats on the great results. Niccolo, could you provide any DARPA Quantum Benchmarking Initiative (QBI) update? I know you made Stage B — I'm assuming there will be broader announcements at some point.
L064 NICCOLO DE MASI
We're not able to announce anything ahead of DARPA — they've been clear about that throughout the program, so we'll all have to watch this space together. We've invested aggressively — not just over the last three quarters but over the last roughly 30 years — to ensure IonQ continues to lead this industry. We built the world's first quantum logic gate in 1995, and we've published the world's first "shovel-ready" blueprint for fault-tolerant quantum computing that is, crucially, manufacturable at scale, at a compelling price point, energy footprint, and space requirement. You can see roughly half a dozen of these systems across three of our offices today, as we assemble prototypes and progress on the 256-qubit chip, the 10,000-qubit chip, and further generations already in the design phase.
L065
We've been focused, since I became CEO, on ensuring quantum computing becomes a mass-market reality rather than a niche phenomenon — making machines robust and affordable, both for sovereign government buyers and, eventually, for enterprise and multiple levels of government to own and operate in their own facilities, controlling their own data, algorithms, and operations, in systems no larger than what we've shipped over the last several years. We continue to work closely with DARPA and will update the market following any DARPA announcements. As you've seen with our other DARPA-related releases — including the DARPA HARQ program announced earlier this year — there are a number of DARPA programs across our broader platform, spanning computing, networking, and other areas we're proud to be involved in.
L066 TROY JENSEN
Quick follow-up on the commercial side — I'd assume most commercial demand is security-related and some other areas too, but I'm curious whether there's a software component. Would IonQ actually own the software IP, or are you primarily partnering on the hardware that drives the IP?
L067 NICCOLO DE MASI
Great question — we're delivering the full stack. When we talk about total or commercial revenue, that includes the hardware solutions around quantum computing as well as the applications that may run on top of it. Customers can also engage us for QCaaS [Quantum Computing as a Service].
L068 INDER SINGH
In many cases, customers ask for our help creating quantum solutions. Sometimes we own the IP for generalized algorithm development we can apply elsewhere; sometimes the customer wants to own it — we meet the customer where they are. We likely have one of the largest, if not the largest, algorithm development teams in quantum. We deploy that team in two ways: centrally, building algorithms that work across many end markets and customers, and directly embedded with our sales team in technical selling, helping customers understand and build applications with our deployment engineers. We're building an ecosystem around us while also supporting other quantum hardware players in their own efforts — this industry needs to grow together, and we see ourselves as the pace-setter: hardware, software, security, and connectivity between machines. It's a scalable, long-term-resilient philosophy. So yes — high-margin software and application development, and high-margin QCaaS, where customers prefer that model.
L069 OPERATOR
Our next question comes from Gary Mobley with StoneX.
L070 GARY MOBLEY (StoneX)
Good evening, thanks for taking the question. You're effectively raising your full-year outlook by $20 million at the top line while reiterating 100% organic revenue growth, same as last quarter. Can you help reconcile what's changed in the last 90 days — is more of the upside coming from acquisitions, and what specifically drove the upside in the June quarter?
L071 INDER SINGH
Thank you for the question. As I mentioned, our organic business actually grew 132% — more than we had expected for the full year. We had a very strong quarter organically, largely driven by computing, similar to how computing drove roughly 80% growth in the 2024–2025 period. We've talked about 100% growth this year; this quarter came in at 132%, so you could argue computing drove the largest portion of growth. At the same time, we had sales across other product lines as well — not every cylinder fires at the same time or in the same way each quarter, so we wouldn't draw a straight line from any single data point, but the portfolio approach means we expect growth to continue showing up across security, networking, and sensing as well — for example, high-bandwidth laser terminals in space, and solutions for sovereign nations or enterprises seeking bandwidth and connectivity. Everything is starting to show signs of broadening strength, with computing as the organic growth anchor.
L072 GARY MOBLEY
Great, thank you. I also wanted to ask about SkyWater's business — prior to closing, I believe consensus revenue was around $610 million. Can you speak to how SkyWater's business has been trending, and whether there's upside given broader semiconductor industry conditions?
L073 INDER SINGH
I'd love to tell you we've spent three months looking under the hood at SkyWater, but we haven't — the deal just received approval and we closed very recently, within days. What I can point to is what we noted last quarter: we've had a commercial relationship with SkyWater to help accelerate our semiconductor roadmap, and Niccolo has spoken to the success we're seeing there. The $120 million figure I gave you is our forecast for what we'll spend with them this year — higher than we originally expected, because we're seeing more success and spending more. Once the two companies are combined, intercompany revenue gets eliminated — so the roughly $120 million going out our door would, in theory, be revenue coming into SkyWater's side pre-elimination. I'm not commenting on their standalone number; they'll file their own 10-Q shortly, likely by Friday, with more detail. We'll come back in a few weeks to a month with the specifics of those eliminations — there are some other items in their customer contracts we still need to fine-tune. We're excited about leveraging their knowledge base and helping them expand their own service to other players; we also bring capital to the table that they didn't previously have. It's a symbiotic combination — and yes, there is revenue on their side tied to other quantum companies as well, though we believe we're already their largest customer, and that revenue will be eliminated on consolidation.
L074 OPERATOR
Our next question comes from John McPeak with Rosenblatt Securities.
L075 JOHN MCPEAK (Rosenblatt Securities)
Niccolo, Inder — nice upside in Q2 and on guidance, and congrats on closing the deal and on the organic growth. With 256 high-quality physical qubits commissioning in the first half of next year, and a path to 10,000, this seems like it would attract serious interest from new customers. Any color on interest levels? You now have the fab and are iterating quickly.
L076 NICCOLO DE MASI
I'll hand part of this to Inder, but I'd frame it this way: what we've executed over the last six or seven quarters has taken this company from being a long-established quantum computing company — I'd argue the leading one — to doing meaningfully more, faster, and in a manufacturable, robust way with a path to full data-center-scale solutions at compelling price points, energy consumption, and space requirements for governments and enterprise. But we don't stop at computing — we're also leading in defense-in-depth quantum cybersecurity, we hold what we believe are the patents that matter for quantum networking (enabling distributed quantum computing and distributed entanglement), and we have leading atomic clocks and quantum sensors — gravimeters and inertial sensors. Combined with our position across military domains, from submarines to satellites, we're investing across all of these growth vectors simultaneously — none of them are "or," they're all "and." We're proud that demand is showing up across multiple products with multiple customers and partners. We believe we represent roughly half of the revenue in the public sector portion of this industry, and probably the majority of R&D spend as well. Customer recognition is showing up quarter on quarter — 287% year-on-year growth, organic growth ahead of our own prior expectations, again. The White House executive orders are a nice reflection that quantum is inflecting, and we believe there's a real scale difference between what we're delivering across our platform and what any other company in this space is doing — both on the technology roadmap and on commercialization. We intend to keep our foot on the gas; we see clear signs that continued investment keeps pulling milestones forward on the roadmap. A year ago, people thought Q-Day was a 2030s event; they now understand it's happening this decade — the same shift has occurred with our demonstrations of quantum advantage and higher technology readiness levels (TRLs) for our sensors on submarines and satellites.
L077 INDER SINGH
I'd just underscore two things customers care about: first, do you have a credible path and architecture to fault-tolerant computing, with all the implications worked out? Second, can you actually build it, and will you be first? We believe increasingly that we can — our fifth-generation machine is being deployed now, sixth-generation next year, seventh the year after, with fault-tolerant computing also being delivered along that path — this isn't a line five years out. Between the SkyWater acquisition and the Oxford Ionics acquisition, we've invested roughly $3 billion to make this happen — more than most countries. Having both companies under one roof unleashes a lot of potential, and we believe benefits the rest of the industry too, given the capital we bring to SkyWater. Customers are increasingly telling us: "we'll take your Tempo system, but put us first in line for the 256-qubit or 10,000-qubit machine" — and we're saying, buy the Tempo now, and you'll be first in line.
L078 JOHN MCPEAK
One quick follow-up, away from compute — I've been hearing that PQC is not provably safe from quantum hacking, and you have strong QKD assets. Are you seeing momentum there, any reaction building around this?
L079 NICCOLO DE MASI
We've been early and are the largest player in QKD for good reason — NIST requested PQC algorithm submissions almost a decade ago, anticipating this moment, and something like 81 of 83 submissions were shown within 90 days to be potentially crackable by a quantum computer, with only one or two candidates still considered robust. Current AI-era capabilities are already probing PQC algorithms and suggesting some may be less durable than assumed even weeks ago. We've always believed the code-making/code-breaking race is continual, occurring largely at the software level via PQC — a race going back arguably thousands of years, and one that will continue. At the same time, there's increasing recognition among governments and industry — reflected in QKD network investments across Europe over the past year, and substantial historical investment in Asia, including China's significant ground- and space-based QKD investment over the past decade — that Western nations broadly are likely to recognize the value of QKD, which by definition requires violating the laws of physics to intercept. That has advantages both in a future large-scale quantum computing era and today, in an era of increasingly capable AI systems. We like our position in quantum computing, and we love our position in quantum security, where we're the only company offering true defense-in-depth, built over more than a decade. We also like our position in sensing and networking — these technologies work together; our position in entanglement-distribution quantum networking means we understand how to deploy security within networks, and having deployed commercially earlier than others in computing, networking, and security means our workforce simply has more practical experience — analogous to a military that has actually operated submarines, satellites, and carriers in real conditions versus one that has only built them. From the day our first computer turned on, in 2017, it takes years to build compilers, get algorithms running, deploy computers, and demonstrate solving useful problems — the same multi-year buildout applies in security and sensing. We're proud of our technical teams, and proud that, like Steve Jobs's "real artists ship," we deploy. We're seeing strong inbound interest and receptivity now that the administration has effectively directed that U.S. infrastructure needs these protections.
L080
One more point: we'll be living in a hybrid security world for a long time — classical security infrastructure already in place, quantum security being layered in. We're now able to scan customer networks for quantum-related vulnerabilities, not just classical ones, often starting at the CEO/CIO/CTO level with the question "am I vulnerable, and where?" We can map that on day one, help customers understand their worst vulnerabilities, and support remediation via PQC, QKD, or another approach — continuously monitoring over time. As we get closer to Q-Day, I expect compliance requirements will eventually require organizations to demonstrate they've secured their networks against quantum, not just classical, attacks. We're preparing customers for that now, at the software and hardware layers, and we expect to continue investing in security alongside computing — it's our next growth vector.
L081 OPERATOR
Our next question comes from Tyler Anderson with Craig-Hallum, on for Richard [surname not clearly captured in source audio].
L082 TYLER ANDERSON (on for Richard, Craig-Hallum)
Thank you for taking my question. Regarding the quantum communications research center, will the memory installed there be used for QKD or for entanglement distribution? And any color on your work with Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) — whether that involves your linear trap, QCCD, or other products? I'd love more detail, noting Sandia's history of work in this space, including the Roadrunner system.
L083 INDER SINGH
Quantum memory is one of the capabilities we bring to the table today and continue to invest in — we've announced an R&D center near our customer EPB in Chattanooga, given the significant quantum innovation activity there; Vanderbilt University is also opening a quantum campus nearby. We chose Chattanooga because of that developing ecosystem. This will be a multi-generation product investment — quantum memory modules used for caching or other purposes, either internally or as part of our merchant-supplier strategy, potentially sold to other companies building quantum computers that need memory capability. We believe we're one of very few, if not the only, players able to support caching of photons for photonics applications as well — an important milestone we're taking seriously across the management team.
L084
EPB is a good example of a forward-thinking customer — they built one of the nation's fastest fiber-optic networks roughly a decade ago, and now that same network can be quantum-secure, quantum-entangled, quantum-ready, and paired with an on-site quantum computer. EPB is also doing important work with us on energy-grid optimization. The Chattanooga/Oak Ridge area has strong talent density and research infrastructure, including the national labs, and we've had support from Senator Blackburn on the National Quantum bill and related state initiatives. We'll keep the market updated on this work.
L085 TYLER ANDERSON
And on Sandia specifically?
L086 NICCOLO DE MASI
We touched on this with the earlier question — it's at the MOU stage. There's a lot of connectivity with Sandia, in part because Dr. Rick Mueller previously ran the quantum program there before serving as a director at DARPA [as heard: "IRPA"], and later joined IonQ roughly 18 months ago. Sandia has long been one of the most active homes of U.S. national-lab work in quantum, over many years. This is an exciting validation and endorsement — as Inder and I have both said, we're making quantum real, affordable, robust, and deployable, and this is a team that understands the scale of the effort, which I've described before as akin to the Manhattan Project of our era, with New Mexico again playing an outsized role. This matters not just for us, but for the next several generations, and I believe for the 21st century broadly. We're helping position the nation to prevail from both a national security and a national economic growth perspective — via the SkyWater foundry and via IonQ's direct roadmap. There are also clear opportunities for near-to-medium-term collaboration in the energy sector: Sandia brings domain expertise we don't have, and we bring commercially rugged quantum systems expertise they can benefit from.
L087 OPERATOR
Our next question comes from [name transcribed as "Nahal Chotski"; unconfirmed spelling] with Northland Capital Markets.
L088 ANALYST (Northland Capital Markets)
Thank you, and congrats on another strong quarter financially. Inder, your second-half guidance implies roughly $135 million to $145 million [figures as stated in source audio] — could you give us a sense of how that's distributed across the third and fourth quarters, and help us think through the underlying trajectory?
L089 INDER SINGH
We don't plan for revenue decline — we plan for revenue growth. Thank you for the question. There are two things we want to be respectful of: first, following the SkyWater close, next quarter we'll be guiding for the combined company, and the quarter after that as well — we may share more color at Investor Day, and certainly at the close of the quarter. Second, the eliminations I mentioned play out over roughly the same two quarters. Rather than try to finesse standalone Q3/Q4 IonQ numbers for you, we'd prefer to give you combined-company numbers once we can do so properly — recognize that the combined entity has more revenue than IonQ alone today, and we want to present that correctly. We wanted to give you the IonQ-only view today so you understood the underlying momentum continues. We have a five-year track record of setting the bar and clearing it, and we intend to keep doing that — this approach mainly reflects the fact that the deal closed only days before this earnings call, giving us time to properly allocate the roughly $120 million in intercompany spend. Please don't read this as any signal of a slowing trajectory.
L090 ANALYST (Northland Capital Markets)
Understood, thank you. And quickly — the 256-qubit chip from SkyWater does not include integration of technology from LightSync [name as heard; possibly "Lightsynq"], correct? It's just the Oxford Ionics microwave excitation sources?
L091 NICCOLO DE MASI
That's right — the photonics and quantum memory/networking IP base sits in our Boston office, which is growing nicely, and that quantum memory capability is important both for extending secure communications via QKD across long distances and for enabling quantum data centers of any size, on the ground or in space, complementing our space-based quantum sensing and signals business. We're thinking about our full quantum platform and what we can deploy across each domain — you're seeing the benefit not just in cross-sell to customers, but in solutions that couldn't be created any other way. But yes, correct — SkyWater is building chips with ever more qubits on-die, even before networking multiple chips together. We believe we can ultimately get to millions of physical qubits on a single chip. We're currently showing milestones on the 256-qubit chip at full prototype QPU stage; the 10,000-qubit chip is also beginning tape-out, with larger qubit-count generations following in design. We've been a commercial partner with SkyWater for some time, and things have accelerated, as reflected in prior quarterly updates on technical milestones — they've been a great commercial partner and we expect that to continue as a wholly owned subsidiary.
L092
One additional point: SkyWater took the majority of consideration in this transaction in IonQ stock — it was largely a stock-swap transaction, and their board, which conducted significant reverse diligence on us, got comfortable with the thesis that, as I'd put it, "one plus one equals thirty." You're seeing early signs of that on the 256-qubit chip, and we expect to see more acceleration further out on the roadmap as we collaborate increasingly effectively going forward.
L093 OPERATOR
This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Niccolo de Masi for any closing remarks.
L094 NICCOLO DE MASI
Thank you, operator. Our mission is to solve the world's hardest problems and to create tremendous national security, societal, and commercial value. Delivering on that mission takes more than a computer — it takes an entire quantum value chain and ecosystem. With SkyWater now closed, IonQ is the only vertically integrated, full-stack quantum platform company, and the largest merchant supplier to the U.S. and allied quantum ecosystem. We are already leveraging SkyWater to accelerate and de-risk our fault-tolerant quantum computers via our published fault-tolerant architecture. I want to thank our colleagues for their extraordinary efforts, and our shareholders for their continued trust. We look forward to welcoming you at our Investor Day on September 8th at the New York Stock Exchange, where we'll share exciting updates across the entire IonQ quantum platform. Thank you for joining us today and for your questions. Have a great day.
L095 OPERATOR
The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.
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