IBM's Anderon locks in $1 billion CHIPS Act quantum foundry deal

IBM's Anderon locks in $1 billion CHIPS Act quantum foundry deal

Thu, September 17, 2026 at 3:41 PM GMT+3 2 min read

• IBM -4.38%

Anderon, an IBM subsidiary, finalized a $1 billion research-and-development award from the U.S. Department of Commerce on Wednesday under the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act, the company said. The funding will support Anderon's efforts to advance quantum wafer manufacturing at its facility in Albany, New York.

Anderon operates a 300-millimeter quantum wafer foundry that serves customers across the quantum industry. IBM has put up $1 billion of its own money alongside the federal award, the company said. Production at the facility is underway, with quantum wafers already in process.

"This agreement with the Department of Commerce strengthens our ability to deliver the manufacturing scale the quantum industry needs," Anderon CEO Mukesh Khare said in a statement. IBM Research Director Jay Gambetta said that by concentrating on wafer fabrication, Anderon gives IBM "a reliable baseline fab" able to support its annual processor development targets.

Anderon's foundry produces wafers for superconducting qubit arrays, quantum input/output signaling, and readout signal chain components, the company said. The venture plans to expand into additional quantum technology types in the future.

The Anderon award is part of a broader $2 billion package distributed across nine quantum computing companies under the CHIPS and Science Act. GlobalFoundries is in line for $375 million, while D-Wave Quantum, Rigetti Computing, and Infleqtion are each expected to receive $100 million. Each of the nine firms will give the federal government a minority ownership stake in exchange for the funding. IBM said at the time that Anderon would be positioned to serve a broad range of industry customers, not just IBM itself.

The finalization follows a letter of intent between IBM and the Commerce Department announced in May. Last week, Rigetti Computing, D-Wave Quantum, and Quantinuum each finalized $100 million deals with the department, according to Barron's.

IBM stock fell 3.3% on Wednesday. The stock has declined nearly 19% this year.