Quantum Computing: A Journey with Many Challenges

The stocks of Rigetti Computing are currently experiencing record-breaking surges, yet the company's CEO, Subodh Kulkarni, warns investors against excessive expectations. In the latest episode of the podcast "Opening Bid," Kulkarni explains that it will still take time before the company achieves sustainable revenue increases and profits. At a conference of the investment bank Needham in New York City, Kulkarni emphasized that Rigetti is still in the midst of technology development. The path to perfecting the technology is crucial before serious revenue increases can be expected. The recent surge in the stock is partially attributed to the hype around artificial intelligence and quantum computing, which has attracted mainly speculative investors. On Tuesday, Rigetti's stock price climbed by 48%, with similarly positive trends shown by D-Wave Quantum with a rise of 23% and Quantum Computing with nearly 14%. These gains followed a decline the previous day, triggered by skeptical statements from Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, who remarked that "useful" quantum computers might still be over a decade away. However, Kulkarni remains optimistic. Despite a deficit of $45 million last year, Rigetti plans a possible new capital raise only by mid-2026. Currently, the company is in an investment phase, with initial revenues mainly from government contracts. Kulkarni hopes that significant revenue opportunities can be reached in three to five years before the company crosses the profitability threshold. Wall Street remains confident, seeing great long-term potential in the quantum computing sector. Analyst Craig Ellis of B. Riley attributes the recent technological advancements a growing utility that could strengthen confidence in the scalability of quantum computing.