Podcast | DARPA’s Quantum Proving Ground — with University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Brian DeMarco: DARPA is very protective of IP. This is a program, the Quantum Benchmarking Initiative, where they will take a deep dive into R&D plans and hardware prototypes. They were very clear that they will protect trade-secrets IP very carefully because they view this as crucial to their mission of helping advance and accelerate the route to utility-scale quantum computing.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: Quantum information science deals with the world of the very small. Sure, but imagine 128 acres of land devoted to advancing QIS. Now, imagine this megacomplex in a major city. The Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park is expected to draw leading companies and researchers to Chicago, and DARPA is already playing a significant role.

Find out what this will mean for advancing the industry and the race to fault-tolerant quantum computing in this episode of The Post-Quantum World. I’m your host, Konstantinos Karagiannis. I lead Quantum Computing Services at Protiviti, where we’re helping companies prepare for the benefits and threats of this exploding field. I hope you’ll join each episode as we explore the technology and business impacts of this post-quantum era.

Our guests today are from the University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign. We have Brian DeMarco, who’s director of the Illinois Quantum Information Science and Technology Center, or IQUIST, and Harley Johnson, the associate dean for research at the Granger College of Engineering. I’m glad we have you both on today.

We cover what’s going on in Illinois a lot, not only because we’re part of the CQE here at Protiviti but also because Illinois is one of the most popular areas vying for the title of “the Quantum Silicon Valley.” We just did an episode on funding in Colorado, and I wanted to talk about the federal and state money coming to Illinois and Granger College for the Quantum Proving Ground. There’s a lot to cover today. But before we get to all that, let’s orient listeners a little bit who will be hearing your voices. Could you start by introducing yourself and how you found your way to QIS?

Brian DeMarco: I’m Brian DeMarco. I’m an experimental physicist. I came to the University of Illinois in 2003 as a young assistant professor, and I’ve been here ever since. I run a research group that works on building quantum computers and quantum networks using atoms and light, and I’ve been doing that for the last 25 years.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: Harley, same question.

Harley Johnson: I’m a faculty member here at the University of Illinois in mechanical science and engineering and in materials science. I’ve been a faculty member here for about 24 years. I got my start in graduate school working on quantum dots and strain effects in semiconductor materials, and I’ve worked in that area, generally in electronic materials and photonics, optical materials, adjacent to quantum information but not directly in that space. In the last few years, I’ve gotten involved in some big projects, including the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park, most recently.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: You’ve both definitely been involved in this space for quite a while. Could you elaborate a little bit on the core mission of the Illinois Quantum Proving Ground we’re talking about today — explain what it is and why it exists?

Brian DeMarco: We should zoom out first, because the Illinois DARPA Quantum Proving Ground is part of this larger Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park, which is being led by a university-related organisation created by the University of Illinois. Harley, you might be the right person to give a picture of that park. Then we can zoom into, what is the proving ground, or what is that mission? What do you think?

Harley Johnson: The Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park is a new project that’s just been announced by the state of Illinois in July. This is an ambitious public–private partnership that is going to be located physically within the city limits of Chicago on the South Side, right on Lake Michigan — a big 128-acre campus devoted to scale-up of quantum computing hardware and the associated software and algorithms work that will go along with that. The stakeholders are the state of Illinois, the city of Chicago, all the research institutions in the state of Illinois, the research universities and the national labs. We’re starting to sign up industry members — most notably our first anchor tenant, PsiQuantum.

It’s a big R&D park that will host companies, researchers, all of whom are focused on scale-up of quantum computing. That’s the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park, As Brian said, the DARPA Quantum Proving Ground is one of the central components of that ambitious project.

Brian DeMarco: That proving ground is what it sounds like. It is a project to prove out an engineering pathway to utility scale for quantum computing. This is a partnership between the state of Illinois and DARPA, an incredible organisation that’s done everything from helping develop the internet to vaccines — all kinds of benefits to society. Their idea here is, the possible benefits of quantum computing to society could be enormous, could transform industries overnight, if you could get a big enough error-corrected machine that could provide market value.

DARPA’s definition of utility scale is a quantum computer that provides more value than it costs to build or to operate it. It’s a very focused mission. It’s open to any quantum computing qubit, any architecture, whether it’s ion traps or superconductors or neutral atoms or photons, you name it — something we maybe even haven’t discovered yet — where it goes through a series of phases to try to deliver working prototypes to the proving ground, which will live at the park. The park will have the infrastructure to support all these platforms, including cryogenics, at the largest scale in the United States. That’s the mission of that proving ground.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: It’s like a subset inside of the park. Because PsiQuantum is going to be involved, do they benefit, then, from the DARPA proving ground as well? Their goal is basically the same — to build a utility-scale quantum computer. How would that synergy work between those pieces?

Brian DeMarco: The DARPA program is a competitive program. Companies from around the world have to compete for DARPA funding. If they use the proving ground in the state of Illinois, the state of Illinois is also committed to making an investment, so PsiQuantum could compete as part of this program just like any other company.

Harley Johnson: That characterises it pretty well. The central utilities that will be provided at the park will serve PsiQuantum, and they’ll serve the performers that receive competitive funding from DARPA. The larger and the more robust the ecosystem we can create at the park, the more the individual companies will benefit because we can offer more in terms of cryo capacity and we can offer other benefits to the companies that will locate there. We see this as a synergy between big partners like PsiQuantum — and whether or not they participate in the DARPA programs, the presence of the DARPA program will create some synergy.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: Can you give listeners a sense of the size of the investment from the state and federal levels — how big a deal this really is?

Harley Johnson: It’s part of the state of Illinois FY 2025 budget, which was passed in June. The state of Illinois is committing $500 million, almost all of which is going to be targeted at the quantum and microelectronics park.

But all that $500 million is intended to support quantum and microelectronics R&D. Some of that is intended for economic-development purposes for the state of Illinois, and it breaks down into several categories as articulated in the state budget. In that $500 million investment, there’s $200 million set aside for shared cryo at the quantum park. There’s $100 million set aside for site readiness to help us build the park, and then an additional $200 million is set aside for state of Illinois co-investments that can be used to help us secure federal funding that can support the work we’re doing. That is, in part, what has helped us work with DARPA in the form of matching funds.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: DARPA is putting in the money that’s considered federal money. Is that how that’s coming in?

Harley Johnson: DARPA is creating a new program, the DARPA Quantum Benchmarking Initiative, and dollars from that program that flow into Illinois will be matched by Illinois state resources.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: That’s an impressive project. That’s quite a scale. I’m sure most people listening think it’s probably triple what they expected to hear. That’s impressive. This is going to be like quantum Disney World. It sounds like such a robust place to be and such an exciting place to be. Will there be any potential trickiness with IP? Will companies have any hesitation — like, “We’re participating in this thing that’s funded? Do we now lose our qubit? Will we be giving up something?” Are there any concerns like that?

Harley Johnson: Brian may have some additional comments from the DARPA point of view, but this is something we’re very much committed to working around and working carefully to support. There are examples of other innovation R&D ecosystems around the country that do this well. I think of Albany NanoTech and the microelectronics industry, where you have large shared facilities — you have many companies working side by side. Sometimes you have physical space that’s carved out for individual companies so they can secure the work they’re doing. You work out IP arrangements on a case-by-case basis upfront so everybody knows what they’re getting into.

Certainly, that’s consistent with the way we do some of our industry-funded research at big universities like the University of Illinois. We have labs where companies come in and they’re working elbow to elbow with their competitors in some cases in shared user facilities. There are models that allow us to manage that.

Brian may have some thoughts on the DARPA side, but this is something we feel well prepared to handle. Companies can make their decisions about whether they want to work in this environment. Some may not, but we think many will want to participate in an ecosystem like this.

Brian DeMarco: We’ve been talking with many companies, and there’s a high level of excitement about the facilities and the opportunities we’re building. DARPA is very protective of IP, and this is a program, the Quantum Benchmarking Initiative (QBI), where they will take a deep dive into R&D plans and hardware prototypes. At the QBI proposers’ day, they were very clear that they will protect trade-secrets IP very carefully because they view this as crucial to their mission of helping advance and accelerate the route to utility-scale quantum computing. They don’t want to get in anybody’s way. They want to make sure they put their foot on the gas pedal and get going faster.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: Conspiracy theorists listening probably will be thinking, “They just want to see when that first dangerous machine is built that they can get their hands on” — something crazy like that. But you do have to at least give fair notice if you’re getting that close to a potentially dangerous machine. That seems like a responsible thing to do.

What are some of the beneficial ways that this park would feed back into the ecosystem in Chicago right now? You’ve got this idea that companies will be working together in close quarters, and it might spur some innovation. But then you’ve also got academia in close quarters and you’ve got government in close quarters. What kind of sharing do you anticipate happening. Do you think this will be good? What kind of two-directional sharing might occur?

Harley Johnson: There are a lot of examples you could point to. As an academic, we’re very excited to have the opportunity to get our students and our postdocs working in an environment like this. That benefits all sides. It clearly benefits the students and the postdocs to have an opportunity to work on exciting applied research. There’s no question that there are benefits for the companies that come to do their work to get access to well-trained talent — to get the students into their projects at an early stage. With the network of universities we have nearby — the University of Chicago, Northwestern University, the University of Illinois and others — there’s a huge bench. There’s a huge talent pool. Getting that group of researchers engaged in applied research that’s driven by the industry, that’s a huge feedback mechanism we want to take advantage of. Similarly, getting the national labs involved is also very exciting.

Brian DeMarco: Having the park and having the companies there will draw more talent into the universities in the state, which then can feed into the industry because it’s an exciting area. My experience has been that young students want to get involved.

The other piece I can see is, let’s say the project is successful and we deliver utility-scale computing. That will be a boon for a lot of research that happens at the national labs and at universities — everything from materials science to high-energy particle physics. If applications such as machine learning work out, accelerating machine learning, that touches almost everything. I can see that benefit too of this virtuous cycle of talent coming in, companies succeed, companies draw more talent and then the research and the science advances.

Harley Johnson: In addition to the training side and getting researchers engaged, one of the things we’ve seen a lot of excitement about is that there are potential end users in the industry community around Chicago. Chicago has a booming commercial industrial ecosystem across many sectors — a very diverse economy. You’ve got a lot of companies that see themselves as potential end users for a quantum-computing resource. They want to be present at the beginning. They want to learn how they might attack some of the problems that are important in their industry using quantum computing. As and when solutions start to become available, the companies situated here are going to have a line of potential customers waiting to get engaged. Part of the motivation for the state to make a big, aggressive investment like this is to get this resource connected to industry.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: Part of what the Chicago Quantum Exchange (CQE) is good at doing is keeping all these events happening where those companies attend and they can see what’s coming, get a sense of what use cases are appearing, and be ready and excited. Do you anticipate that the park will be able to have even better events like that hosted there? With access, you’ll be able to see shiny things. It won’t just be slides on the wall. There could be mini tours and that sort of thing. Do you expect some kind of outreach to be going on there?

Harley Johnson: Yes, and we’re working closely with the Chicago Quantum Exchange, thinking about ways their programming can feed into what we’re doing. The facilities we’re going to build can support some of their goals in terms of outreach. We definitely see this as a place that is open to the community. It’s open to potential end users and open to kids who want to learn about this exciting industry. It’ll be a physical space that will allow us to convene some of these activities very much hand in hand with CQE.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: I’m excited to tour it already. I want this thing to be complete and ready. I’m going to bring a hard hat to pose for a shovel photo.
We talked about education. Do you anticipate any new majors or programs of study appearing at the schools because of this? Do you see it feeding back into a very cohesive track for quantum coding, optics, whatever, focused areas of study? One thing that keeps coming up with workforce development is that not everyone wants to get a Ph.D. Some people just want something they can roll with. like if you want to become a software developer now or whatever. Do you think this kind of environment will help foster some of that feedback into the programs in the area?

Brian DeMarco: There are discussions happening all over the state right now about what those programs could look like, whether it is quantum software engineering at different levels — a bachelor’s, a master’s. Maybe you don’t need a Ph.D. Things like that.

You brought up optics —optics or electronics degrees that are a little bit more tailored to finishing your degree as an undergraduate and jumping into a company that’s in the state, which would be exciting. We’re in active discussions — one of the partners in this whole endeavor is City Colleges of Chicago. What kind of degrees can community colleges offer to students where they can contribute something?

That just came up in a discussion Harley and I had last week — cryo engineers. This is going to be the biggest cryo plant and cryo facility in the United States. It’s an awesome opportunity to train those cryo engineers and cryo technicians — hands-on experience you can get in only a very few places. That’s needed not just in quantum computing but also in many other industries, including aerospace. The benefits are manifold here, and I’m excited about that part of it.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: As this is being built up, I’m assuming you’re going to want to start switching the lights on in certain areas first as the rest builds up. Do you have a prioritisation roadmap of what the first areas of research that will come alive are?

Harley Johnson: Yes, and we’re excited, and we wish we could turn on everything at the same time. But the top priority is getting that cryo facility up and running. That will enable a lot of other things. That cryo facility consists of two things: It’s the physical plant that produces the cryo, and then a shared research facility that is adjacent. Both of those are top priority.

PsiQuantum is also moving very aggressively to get their own facility up and running at the same time. We’re planning in lockstep with PsiQuantum as we set up this cryo facility that’ll be at the heart of the campus. Over time, that’ll grow. There’ll be growing facilities for companies to lease and take root in the park, but it’s that cryo facility that’s at the heart of it all.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: I realise you can’t speak for PsiQuantum, but I’ve had PsiQuantum on before, and I know their general plans to build a million-qubit machine, and they’re going to do it in some kind of interconnect way. We don’t know how many qubits will be in each box inside. Do you know, though, if being part of this is integral to that plan, or is this a new area of research for them? Did they realise there was some limitation — like, “We can’t get there without this new investment, this new satellite location”? Do you know if there’s any of that involved?

Brian DeMarco: They’ve been developing their plans, and they’re part of the US2QC DARPA program, and they’ve been developing engineering roadmaps and R&D plans for how to get to a larger scale. They, like many companies that rely on low temperatures, realise that to get to that large scale you just described will require a cryo plan. This is not going to be the way we have little cryostats like I have in my lab here at the university, where there’s a little helium compressor chugging away all day and all night, trying to keep that thing going, where that can provide a couple of watts of cooling power at 50 Kelvin. You need kilowatts of cooling power and a different kind of facility to make that work.

PsiQuantum is one company that, just as they developed the roadmap, they said, "We need this.” The state of Illinois is creating infrastructure they can leverage for that. Other companies are coming to the same realisation: Whether it’s because they use superconductors for detection or superconducting circuits as qubits, you need a massive scale. The current way of doing things is not going to take them all the way.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: This is more critical to them, possibly, for their path forward.

Brian DeMarco: I think so, and that will be true for many companies that involve cryogenics and need to go to very large-scale.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: Pretty soon, we’ll be able to point to the coldest place on Earth. We’ll know exactly where it is. Did I say on Earth? I meant the universe.

We’ve tried, with the CQE, to get certain other initiatives in place before — the stuff with the National Science Foundation. Do you see a center like this as being like a giant magnet pulling in other initiatives in the future? Do you see things being built around it and expanding and truly creating something that’s like a Silicon Valley?

Harley Johnson: I think so. But also, we’re just very focused on the mission of scale-up. That’s the top priority. But I can see how this could catalyse a lot of exciting initiatives, whether that’s through the National Science Foundation or other organisations. It is part of an ecosystem. There will continue to be important activities happening in the national labs nearby and in the universities nearby and through the CQE. Of course, all our organisations in the state and beyond are members of the CQE. It’s a network. What we’re talking about here is a physical facility that’s going to be at an impressive scale. And that will, of course, attract attention, and it’ll attract, hopefully, some new initiatives we haven’t even thought of yet. It’s just part of a network. By growing that network, we think there will be some interesting surprises around the corner.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: Is there room to expand this? Is it being designed in such a way that there will be room to build out? I realise it’s an impressive number of acres. I’m wondering if it’s designed that way — like, we can add buildings or whatever the case may be.

Harley Johnson: It’s a massive site of a former steel plant. This phase we’re talking about is 128 acres, but there’s additional land nearby that could double that or triple that. That’s a possibility. It’s very likely the overall site will attract other high-tech industry and other exciting developments over time. But we’re definitely thinking about how this grows. We’re thinking not just about acres and square feet but also about, how do we provide more cryo over time if that becomes important? This is sustainable. It uses a good amount of power, but it’s not going to outstrip what is available. It’s environmentally friendly. This is not going to leave a heavy footprint on the site. There is the possibility of expanding if the science and the industry requires it. We’ll see where it goes.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: As part of that future-forward thing, Brian might want to answer this, but especially with DARPA involved, are there key milestones or timelines or things that they’re, I don’t want to say pressuring, but putting forth, “You want to shoot for this.” Is there anything like that that’s coming along with this whole thing?

Brian DeMarco: DARPA’s ambitious. That’s their job. Their job is to prevent technological surprise. They put a timeline in the Quantum Benchmarking Initiative solicitation. They want to have success for an engineering pathway — at least one to utility scale — by 2033. The challenge on the table is to have the facilities ready — R&D plans, building out a prototype and success by 2033. We’ll see if we can get there. I’m excited about it.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: Do they have a clear metric of what success is? What is that? How scalable, how impressive a machine, fault-tolerant, are we talking? How many qubits are they keeping in mind for logical, let’s say?

Brian DeMarco: Not yet. They’re still developing that. One metric they put is their definition of utility, which provides more market value than it costs to build and operate. They view this program as geared toward creating an industry for quantum computing, which is something DARPA talks about. If it’s valuable enough, companies will want to purchase it or purchase time on it because it will create value for their company. That’s their metric, and connected to their timeline is to try to accelerate to that metric. The program is designed around companies deploying a prototype that’s evaluated, that proves out an enduring pathway, and then additional funding might come in to then build big ones should a prototype be proved out.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: This is starting to sound like the Manhattan Project — to build a big one.

Brian DeMarco: Governor Pritzker has used those words.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: The year 2033 jumps out at me. As you probably know, that’s what NIST is pushing on. The government, they’re agreeing that 2035 is when you should have PQC in place. It’s interesting that they’re, like, “2033 is our deadline.” They’re right up against each other. That’s not lost on me.

One last thing I want to ask before we wrap up: There were recently new export guidelines, things that we should send out. We’re back to the old crypto wars again — you can’t send out anything. We can’t send an encrypted phone like in the old days. Now we can’t send a qubit physically through space. Does any of that start to affect centers like this that are talking about bringing companies together, and potentially, their employees are from other countries and they’re coming in and there’s a back-and-forth. Is there any new level of thought that has to be given as a result?

Brian DeMarco: This is something for the park that we’ve been actively thinking through. It’s crucial to keep the park and facilities like this as open as possible while being realistic about protecting what could be an incredibly important national-security asset — the IP and the physical hardware. This is an evolving landscape where people are thinking through maintaining our superpower as a nation, which is that we have open environments while being realistic about the potential threats. That has been the federal government’s approach to many things in this area.

One thing that’s interesting is that because of the new export regulations, we may see many of the big players building quantum computers in Europe and elsewhere and wanting to open an operation in the U.S. so they can manufacture hardware here that they may sell in the U.S. We may see an influx of companies opening up U.S. operations at places like the park in order to participate in the quantum-computing economy to come.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: That’s great for everyone.

Brian DeMarco: I agree.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: It’s too early to shut everything down to IP right now. We should be sharing as much as possible. That’s what’s been so refreshing about the whole CQE experience: Everyone there is still very much participating together.
I’m super excited about this. I can’t wait to tour the grounds, which I’m sure I’ll get to do soon enough. I wish you guys lots of luck with this.

Harley Johnson: Thank you. We can’t wait to have you come out and see it.

Brian DeMarco: Thank you.

Konstantinos Karagiannis: Now, it’s time for Coherence, the quantum executive summary, where I take a moment to highlight some of the business impacts we discussed today in case things got too nerdy at times. Let’s recap.

Illinois has been positioning itself as a leader in quantum computing for quite some time now, aided by the presence of the Chicago Quantum Exchange. To kick this momentum into high gear, 128 acres of land in southeast Chicago have been set aside for the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park, a quantum-focused research-and-development campus. This major initiative is possible because of half a billion dollars in funding from the state. However, federal money and involvement are playing a part too, with DARPA creating a quantum proving ground in the park.

DARPA’s goal is to create a utility-scale quantum computer by early next decade, and the park aims to create a collaborative ecosystem for companies and researchers to work toward this end. PsiQuantum is already participating, preparing to build a $1 billion fault-tolerant quantum computer at the park. The company will benefit from the large, forthcoming shared cryo facility.

Whenever groups of companies and academics gather, intellectual property concerns tend to creep in, so these are being addressed proactively using past technology research centers as models. The park will also have to cope with new quantum-export regulations in the U.S., which may bring more business to the region as companies seek to build within the U.S. quantum walls.

In addition to bringing us into the era of usable systems, the park should greatly enhance workforce development and quantum technologies. It’s hard to guess all the impacts this park will have on the area, but the potential is there for significant economic boosts to the region. As large as it is, the park is being designed for future expansion and scalability — a quantum Disney World, if you’re a nerd like yours truly.

That does it for this episode. Thanks to Brian DeMarco and Harley Johnson for joining to discuss the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park, and thank you for listening. If you enjoyed the show, please subscribe to Protiviti’s The Post-Quantum World, and leave a review to help others find us. Be sure to follow me on all socials @KonstantHacker. You’ll find links there to what we’re doing in Quantum Computing Services at Protiviti. You can also DM me questions or suggestions for what you’d like to hear on the show. For more information on our quantum services, check out Protiviti.com, or follow @ProtivitiTech on Twitter and LinkedIn. Until next time, be kind, and stay quantum-curious.