IonQ, the first (and disruptive) quantum computing company on the market

To the best of our knowledge, The companies that own these quantum prototypes are IBM, Rigetti, D-Wave and Google, which claims to have quantum supremacy over its competitors due to the capabilities of its equipment. This would of course also include IonQ.

China, through its University of Science and Technology, claims to have completed the development of a superpowerful quantum computer, after two decades of work and research. This information, obviously, is not verifiable by external sources, but must be taken seriously in light of the progress made by the Asian giant.

So only a handful of companies have been able to develop quantum prototypes so far. At least as far as is known… However, it is estimated that IBM and Google are the ones that have made the greatest progress and have the best conditions to continue in that direction.

However, Google claims that their quantum computer is a prototype in development with refinement expected to be ready by 2029. Therefore, care should be taken when hearing the word “quantum” to label a technology and even more a company.

In addition, quantum prototypes can generate errors that must be corrected. Just as there are multiple possible states, there are also multiple ways things can go wrong.

On the other hand, the quantum nature of qubits is quite delicate, so at say the experts, it is extremely difficult to keep a qubit for any length of time. They tend to lose their properties.

Meanwhile, the so-called quantum supremacy will be a concept under construction until these errors are calibrated and the properties of the so-called qubits are stabilized.

However, the possibilities are very great since we are not only talking about quantum hardware, but also quantum software, since These teams will need a new generation of more complex algorithms and programming languages, powerful and intuitive in order to function.

The quantum issue is even in the national interest of all global powers . Both the US, China and the European Union seek differentiating elements that allow them to dominate technology, ergo, the world economy.

USA. for example, it passed a law in December 2018 with broad bipartisan support called “National Quantum Initiative Act”, which established a $1.2 billion fund to finance the research in the quantum field in a period of 5 years.

For many, the next economic revolution will be based on the use of disruptive technologies such as artificial intelligence, robotics and energy storage.

Quantum computing itself should be defined in its own right as one of those technologies and perhaps be the one that allows us to make the leap in those other disciplines. But, while it is perfected, it must be stated that we are still in the initial stages of its development. It is no longer the dream of physicists, it is true, but now it is the nightmare of engineers.

Jay Gambetta, researcher of quantum algorithms and potential applications for IBM, stated in an interview by Will Knight for the MIT Technology Review, published on February 21, 2018 the following:

“We have this device that is more complicated than what you can simulate on a classical computer, but is not yet controllable with the precision that you could with the algorithms you know how to do”.

IonQ: How is your share price going?

Let’s see the daily chart of Japanese candlesticks and volume for the stock of IonQ, Inc.; listed on the NYSE:

Before your departure to stock market the stock hit a high of $12.95 by then go down, so a resistance level (SyR) is estimated around that price level.

The company goes public on October 01, 2021 and ends up closing the trading session with a price of $9.20 per share.

Then, on the following days, it marked a low of $7.07 to start slowly rising. We can consider that there is a support level (SyR) around this price.

In fact , the stock enters a short-term uptrend until November 18, when marks its highest to date at a price of $35.90. Almost four times the starting price.

What we see in the graph below is a turn-in-day or “spike” figure from a precipitous drop in price. At the beginning of 2022 the share is trading around 14.37 per share.

IonQ Stock: Invest Right Now or Wait?

For the third quarter of 2021, the company increased its revenues to 451 thousand dollars, however, as is natural in a relatively new company, it is not yet profitable. It is early days and although the company’s management announced that it had received orders, reservations and others, these cannot be considered as income until they materialize.

In order to get a better idea of ​​the performance of the company and its ability to transform this technology into products and services valued by the market, the company must first generate a significant recurring income. For some analysts, this threshold implies passing the milestone of 10 million dollars per year.

On the other hand, a technology of this type will require huge amounts of resources to continue developing, so it is not foreseeable to expect dividends.

“IonQ must be seen as a stock with growth potential, whose possibilities lie in the progressive increase in its value for the coming years”

Due to its characteristics IonQ should be seen as an action with potential of growth, whose possibilities lie in the progressive increase in its value for the coming years.

In fact, already there is a significant presence of many recognized funds.

Below we observe the 10 funds with the largest shareholding position in IonQ and the changes made in said position in recent quarters:

The first 4 positions are occupied by funds from the Fidelity group, with a global position of 3,225,371 shares. However, as of November 30, 2021, they settled 896,400 shares. Even so, they remain positioned with a good amount.

It is interesting to note that the rest of the ranking grew in net terms by 962,910 shares between September and December 2021.

To have a global vision of current interests that own IonQ we observe below its current shareholding:

So the financial capital that participates in IonQ owns 47% of the company at this time . We are talking about almost half of the capital, so without a doubt, these interests have a positive future expectation.

If there is a positioning, it must be with a very long-term vision. However, it should also be noted that although IonQ is the first company to make this technology accessible through online servers, the applications are relatively limited.

Not necessarily being the first to bring a product to the public implies future dominance of the market. The technological field is full of recent examples where the initial leader ended up disappearing, while in other cases it was absorbed by its competitors.

Possible competitors or allies of IonQ

The game has started and IonQ is not the only one, there are other companies, most started as startups that are developing applications, products and services in the field of quantum computing.

We can define the set of competitive and/or associative interactions between all these companies and those that decide to enter this field as the “quantum ecosystem”. Let’s see the most important companies and projects that make it up:

Of all the current projects, certainly IonQ has the largest market cap so far at $2.57 billion. Has already made the transition from startup to a public company, so which is much more advanced than other similar businesses.

A competitor that should not be overlooked is Rigetti, a start-up that announced on October 06, 2021 an agreement through a SPAC ( Supernova Partners Acquisition Company II, Ltd. – SNII), as did IonQ, to go public soon and begin trading on the NYSE with the ticker “RGTI” under the name of Rigetti Computing, Inc.

It may be prudent to wait for the completion of this process to consider taking a position in IonQ or in the RGTI itself when it is made public.

IonQ’s competitors in a nutshell

D-wave is a private Canadian company who will probably follow in the footsteps of the two s previous. It has a long way to go in the manufacture of quantum computers and in the applications for this equipment.

Quantum Machines is an early-stage Israeli startup. It was founded in 2018 and raised $17.5 million in the first quarter of 2020. Its leader is Avigdor Willenz and it has major partners such as Harel Insurance investments (TA:HARL) and TLV Partners and Battery Ventures.

Quantum Computing is a public company listed on the NASDAQ and specializes in the field of software for quantum computers. Its capitalization reaches 86.3 million dollars.

Arqit Quantum is a company that develops applications for cybersecurity based in the UK. Its capitalization is 1.92 billion dollars.

Finally we have QuantumSi. Like the previous one, this is a company that is already developing specific applications in the field of biological sciences, one of the most promising. Its capitalization reaches 886 million dollars.

We have not fully covered the European ecosystem, but similar startups are likely to exist.

On the other hand, observing and participating with interest are four other strategic players in the technology sector:

IBM which is a pioneer and has a highly qualified staff working on this for decades. They have the quantum computer “IBM Q System 1” and renowned researchers such as Charles Bennett, one of the founding fathers of quantum information theory.

Amazon Web Services which participated in the financing of IonQ even before it went public and is its ally in the network of cloud servers that brings this technology to the public.

Google which already has perhaps the most powerful prototype and claims to have quantum superiority. It is also a partner of IonQ in the cloud through the Google Cloud Marketplace.

Microsoft also participates as an IonQ partner in the cloud through Azure Quantum.

These market leaders also participate in other projects of this type.

Borrowing scientific ideas about evolution, those companies that best adapt to the changing conditions of their environment and the market will be the ones that they will manage to develop and survive this first quantum wave. Whether IonQ will be one of them or not remains to be seen for years to come.

How to buy IonQ shares without paying commissions?

If after reading our extensive review of IonQ you decide to buy shares of this promising quantum computing company, the favorite option and recommended by The Financial Country is the broker eToro.com, an investment platform used by more than 20 million users, based in London and authorized by the CySEC and the FCA (the UK regulator).

In Spain , eToro is registered with the National Securities Market Commission with registration number 2534 (here your registration).

When it comes to buy IonQ shares, eToro offers us a great advantage: Does not charge commissions of any kind (0%) on the purchase, sale or custody of shares

. Another important point in favor of eToro is that it allows you to add funds to your account immediately by credit card, Paypal or bank transfer (among others).

To the above we must add that eToro.com allows you to invest in IonQ by buying fractions of shares

, so that even investors with little capital can invest in large companies whose shares have a high price.