As AI compute needs multiply, one quantum computing firm says it has the edge over Nvidia (NVDA).
“If I was Nvidia, I’d be shaking in my boots,” D-Wave Quantum (QBTS) CEO Alan Baratz told Yahoo Finance at the Semafor World Economy Summit.
Baratz’s company, which develops the hardware and software for quantum systems, claims the AI chip giant is building processors that would be increasingly difficult to power.
“Our quantum computer takes about ten kilowatts of power to run,” Baratz noted, comparing the draw to roughly five or ten GPUs. He pointed to a problem solved in minutes that he claimed would take a massive GPU system nearly a million years and “the world’s power” to complete.
The timing is calculated. April 14 is World Quantum Day, and the sector is surging. Shares of D-Wave jumped nearly 16% on Tuesday, while IonQ (IONQ) soared 18% after scaling its commercial systems beyond a single processor.
Not to be outdone, Nvidia unveiled “Ising,” a family of open-source quantum AI models for error correction.
Nvidia’s move suggests it wants to be the operating system of quantum. “AI is essential to making quantum computing practical,” Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said. It is a hedge: If you can’t beat quantum efficiency, own the software that controls it.
Shares of D-Wave are up roughly 140% over the last year, despite slipping about 3% in the past 30 days.
In Q4 2025, D-Wave reported $2.75 million in revenue — a 19% year-over-year increase — but missed analyst estimates of $3.8 million, according to Bloomberg data. The company reported an adjusted net loss of $0.09 per share, wider than the $0.05 analysts expected.
However, D-wave’s performance has been fueled by “bookings” — promised future contracts — which hit $13.4 million in Q4, a 471% jump from the prior quarter.
The company, valued at $5.3 billion, is making strides in the commercial and federal space. It recently signed a $20 million agreement with Florida Atlantic University (FAU), including a collaboration with Anduril Industries and Davidson Technologies on US air and missile defense applications.
D-Wave also spent $550 million to acquire Quantum Circuits, aiming to shift from niche logistics to universal systems for generative AI.
These deals suggest that some major players are willing to pay to test the tech. D-Wave, which sold its first commercial system to Lockheed Martin in 2011, now focuses on solving AI training bottlenecks.
But there is a limit. Quantum machines are not yet general-purpose. They are specialized tools used for research and optimization tasks. They cannot yet run large language models like those that fueled Nvidia’s trillion-dollar empire. Most developers still rely on traditional chips because quantum hardware remains unstable and prone to errors.
