Intel to Acquire Classiq: A Full-Stack Quantum Computing Platform

Intel announced the agreement jointly from Santa Clara, California and Tel Aviv, Israel. Under it, Intel would acquire Classiq and combine its automated quantum algorithm synthesis platform with three things Intel already has: its quantum software platform, its scalable silicon spin-qubit technology and its advanced semiconductor manufacturing expertise. Intel says the result would make it a full-stack quantum solutions provider, covering everything from the qubit chip to the software developers use to program it.

The combination also widens Intel’s product range. Intel says the deal would allow it to add Quantum Processing Units, or QPUs, to a compute platform portfolio that already spans Central Processing Units, Graphical Processing Units and application-specific integrated circuits. In that framing, quantum becomes one more processor family Intel can offer its customers, with Classiq supplying the software layer that lets developers target it without hand-crafting circuits.

Classiq’s co-founders join Intel’s Quantum Computing Group

Intel chief executive Lip-Bu Tan welcomed Classiq’s founding team by name. “I am delighted to have Nir, Yehuda, Amir and the entire Classiq team join Intel,” he said. Tan added that for more than a decade Intel has made “remarkable progress in quantum computing” by applying its semiconductor innovation, advanced manufacturing and systems engineering expertise to the development of scalable silicon spin-qubit technology. Classiq, in his account, is the piece that completes the stack.

Nir Minerbi, co-founder and chief executive of Classiq, described the deal as a continuation of the company’s founding mission. Since its founding, he said, Classiq has focused on making quantum computing practical and accessible, enabling developers, researchers and enterprises to create scalable quantum applications without requiring deep expertise in quantum circuit design. “Together, Intel and Classiq can help unlock the benefits of quantum computing and accelerate its adoption sooner,” he said.

The transaction is subject to regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions. Until it closes, Intel and Classiq will continue to operate as separate, independent companies, so Classiq’s customers, academic users and hardware partners keep working with the same team and platform through the approval period.

Classiq describes itself as a leading quantum computing software company providing enterprise-grade technology that makes it practical to develop scalable, efficient quantum applications. Its platform combines AI agents, a high-level quantum modelling language and design automation to accelerate the development of optimised, hardware-ready quantum software. It also supports hardware benchmarking, cost and performance optimisation, and execution across quantum hardware platforms. Intel says the platform is used by dozens of global enterprises.

At the centre of the product is Qmod (opens in a new tab), the Quantum Modeling Language, which Classiq made generally available in July 2024 and describes as the first high-level language for quantum coding. Qmod lets developers describe quantum algorithms at a high level of abstraction, mixing quantum-specific concepts with constructs familiar from classical programming languages. Developers state the functional intent of an algorithm, and Classiq’s compiler and synthesis engine work out the hardware-aware implementation details. Classiq says this is the step that moves quantum programming away from the hardware level, where only specialists could work.

Up to 97% shorter circuits in a Deloitte Tohmatsu demonstration

Synthesis matters because circuit length matters. To run on a quantum computer, an algorithm must be written as a quantum circuit, and the longer the circuit, the greater the risk of errors during calculation. In December 2024, Classiq, Deloitte Tohmatsu Group and Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation shared results (opens in a new tab) from a demonstration in materials development, including new organic electroluminescent materials. Deloitte Tohmatsu said one of the two quantum algorithms achieved circuit compression of up to 97 percent, and the other up to 54 percent, showing how efficient circuit design can improve calculation accuracy.

Classiq has also extended the platform toward the fault-tolerant machines the industry is building. On 30 September 2026 it announced its Fault Tolerance Engine (opens in a new tab), which translates optimised logical quantum programs into fault-tolerant execution plans. The engine decides how the protected qubits are laid out, how their interactions are routed and the schedule that runs them, and then measures the physical resources the application needs, including physical qubit requirements, error-correction cycles, code distance, runtime and accumulated error. Because those figures come from the plan the engine actually produced, Classiq says they describe the implementation a machine would run.

Enterprise customers from BMW to Toshiba

Classiq’s commercial footprint grew quickly. When it raised its Series C (opens in a new tab) in May 2025, the company said it had tripled its customer base and revenues year over year and was used by dozens of the top enterprise teams and hundreds of academic institutions worldwide. Named enterprise customers included BMW, Citi, Deloitte, Rolls-Royce, Mizuho and Toshiba, and the company listed collaborations with Microsoft, AWS and NVIDIA. Classiq also forms part of the official curriculum at many top-tier universities, giving it a steady pipeline of developers who learn quantum programming on its tools.

Intel’s case rests on an analogy from its own industry. Chip design software abstracted the work of designing a chip from the complexity of the silicon underneath, and that abstraction let classical computing scale. Intel argues that quantum computing needs the same step: a high-level layer that lets quantum applications grow beyond custom hand-crafted circuits into a mainstream computing platform. Classiq’s synthesis platform is that layer, and Intel says it brings complementary assets to the quantum hardware and software capabilities Intel has developed over the last decade.

On the hardware side, Intel has been investing in quantum computing since 2015. It says it is the only company capable of producing qubit chips and complex cryogenic control electronics at scale using equipment and processes common to conventional silicon-based semiconductor manufacturing. Its approach uses silicon spin qubits, which build on the same manufacturing base as Intel’s conventional processors. Adding Classiq places a developer-facing software platform on top of that manufacturing base, so the people writing quantum applications have a direct route to the hardware Intel builds.

Lip-Bu Tan backed Classiq’s Series B in 2022

The deal also has a personal thread. In February 2022, Classiq announced (opens in a new tab) a US$33 million Series B that included personal investments from Lip-Bu Tan and Harvey Jones, whom it described as chip design titans. At the time, Classiq introduced Tan as the executive chairman and former president and CEO of Cadence Design Systems, a company at the heart of the chip design software Intel now cites as its model. Tan now leads Intel as chief executive and is bringing Classiq into the company he runs.

That background gives the analogy weight. The people steering the deal have watched design automation turn chip design from a specialist craft into an industry with common tools, and the agreement is a bet that quantum software follows the same path. Intel’s announcement makes the link explicit, describing Classiq as providing a unifying software platform that is agnostic to the underlying qubit modality and hardware.

When a hardware maker buys a hardware-agnostic software platform, the commitment that matters most to users is openness, and Intel addressed it directly. Following the close of the transaction, Intel intends to continue to support Classiq’s existing multi-platform integrations and ensure a modality- and hardware-agnostic software solution that continues to enable an open and collaborative quantum software ecosystem. Developers who build on Classiq today keep the ability to run their programs across quantum hardware platforms.

That commitment fits a shareholder base that spans the computing industry. In November 2025, Classiq announced (opens in a new tab) a strategic up-round with participation from AMD Ventures, Qualcomm Ventures and IonQ, alongside financial institutions including Mirae Asset Capital, LeumiTech77 by Bank Leumi and Quantum Eretz. The round totalled tens of millions of dollars and brought Classiq’s cumulative funding to over US$200 million. Minerbi said at the time that as quantum hardware matures, the need for scalable, efficient software becomes even more critical.

Earlier, in July 2025, SoftBank Vision Fund 2 (opens in a new tab) expanded the Series C with a strategic investment, joined by CDP Venture Capital, Italy’s largest venture capital operator. Classiq said SoftBank’s investment followed an in-depth evaluation by its R&D team, which validated Classiq’s ability to generate high-performance quantum circuits that reduce computational costs and deliver superior results on today’s hardware.

From US$48 million in 2022 to over US$200 million

Classiq’s funding history charts a fast rise. The Series B in February 2022 brought total funding to US$48 million in 20 months of existence, with Hewlett Packard Pathfinder, Phoenix, Spike Ventures and Samsung NEXT joining existing investors Wing VC, Team8, Entrée Capital, Sumitomo Corp. through IN Venture, and OurCrowd. In May 2025, a US$110 million Series C led by Entrée Capital, which Classiq called the largest ever for a quantum software company, brought total funding to US$173 million. Participants included Norwest, NightDragon, Hamilton Lane, HSBC and Samsung Next.

Minerbi set out the ambition plainly at the Series C. “We are building the Microsoft of quantum computing,” he said. Joining Intel pairs that software ambition with a partner that manufactures qubit chips and has a decade of quantum hardware work, while the commitment to stay hardware-agnostic keeps the broader ecosystem Classiq built around its platform.

The transaction is subject to regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions, and Intel expects it to close in the first half of 2027. Until then, the two companies operate as separate, independent businesses. The approval period gives Classiq’s enterprise customers, academic users and hardware partners time to see how Intel plans to bring the platform into its quantum roadmap.

After closing, Classiq joins Intel’s Quantum Computing Group, which Tan says the deal transforms into a full-stack quantum computing business. The work ahead is to connect Classiq’s synthesis platform, Qmod language and Fault Tolerance Engine with Intel’s quantum software platform and silicon spin-qubit hardware, while keeping the multi-platform integrations Intel has committed to support. Done well, a developer writing in Qmod could target Intel spin qubits and other hardware from the same environment.

For Intel, the combined platform also gives its QPU ambitions a software story from day one. Customers already familiar with Intel CPUs, GPUs and ASICs gain a path to quantum processing through tools that hundreds of academic institutions and dozens of enterprises already use, and that Classiq has built to measure the physical resources an application needs before it runs on a real machine.

Five milestones after the first-half 2027 close

• –Approvals. Regulatory clearance and the formal close, expected in the first half of 2027.
• –Developer platform. How Classiq’s synthesis platform connects with Intel’s existing quantum software.
• –Spin-qubit targets. Qmod and the Fault Tolerance Engine generating execution plans for Intel silicon spin qubits.
• –Open integrations. Continued support for other hardware platforms, as Intel set out in its ecosystem commitment.
• –Customers. Growth across the enterprise and academic base Classiq built before joining Intel.