When people talk about quantum computers, most of the attention goes to qubits — the units of computation that can harness quantum phenomena to tackle problems conventional computers struggle to solve.
But qubits alone do not make a computer.
To make them perform a calculation, a system must send extraordinarily precise signals, measure their response, process the results and decide, within fractions of a second, what should happen next. That is precisely the layer Israeli company Quantum Machines chose to focus on: not building the quantum processor itself, but building the system that makes it work.
Quantum Machines was founded in 2018 by Dr. Itamar Sivan, Dr. Yonatan Cohen and Dr. Nissim Ofek, three physicists who met at the Weizmann Institute of Science, where they completed their PhDs in the research group of Prof. Moty Heiblum.
Their work in quantum laboratories gave them firsthand experience with a problem that was becoming increasingly important as the field advanced: even if researchers succeed in building better qubits, they still need a fast and precise classical system capable of controlling them.
“We realized that building the computer wasn’t enough — you also need to know how to operate it efficiently,” Sivan later explained.
In a conventional computer, much of the logic is already contained within the processor. In a quantum computer, however, many operations are performed using electromagnetic pulses sent to qubits with extraordinary precision in both timing and intensity.
After each measurement, the system may need to react immediately and alter the next stage of the computation. Even a small delay, synchronization problem or calibration error can affect the result.
Quantum Machines founders Nissim Ofek, Itamar Sivan and Yonatan Cohen
(Photo: Ilya Melnikov)
To address this challenge, Quantum Machines built its Quantum Orchestration Platform, a combination of hardware and software designed to manage the entire process in real time.
At the heart of the system are the company’s OPX controllers and a specialized processing component it developed called the Pulse Processing Unit, or PPU.
The system can generate the signals that operate the qubits, receive their measurements, perform classical calculations and determine what should happen next, with minimal need to send information to an external system.
Alongside the hardware, the company developed QUA, a programming language that allows researchers to define sequences of quantum operations and real-time responses without having to build complex control systems themselves.
The combination can be thought of as a kind of “brain” that translates a quantum algorithm into operations the physical machine can actually perform.
One of the key advantages of this approach is that it is not tied to a single type of quantum computer.
Quantum Machines
(Photo: PR)
The industry has yet to determine whether the future belongs to superconducting qubits, trapped ions, neutral atoms, spin-based systems or another technology entirely. Quantum Machines designed its platform to work across multiple approaches. According to the company, its technology is already used by more than half of the companies worldwide developing quantum computers.
In 2024, that vision took tangible form in Israel.
With support from the Israel Innovation Authority, Quantum Machines opened the Israeli Quantum Computing Center, or IQCC, at Tel Aviv University. The center was designed as an open facility for researchers and companies, bringing together quantum systems based on different technologies and connecting them to a shared control infrastructure and high-performance computing resources.
According to Quantum Machines, it was the first center in the world to bring different types of quantum computers together at a single site while tightly integrating them with NVIDIA DGX Quantum, developed jointly by NVIDIA and Quantum Machines.
In other words, the company was no longer simply providing equipment for quantum computers. It was helping build a model for what could eventually become a “quantum data center.”
Quantum Machines has also moved well beyond the boundaries of a technology experiment as a business.
In February 2025, it raised $170 million in a Series C funding round, bringing its total funding to $280 million. In 2026, the company continued expanding in Europe through acquisitions while also launching infrastructure designed to connect quantum processors directly with powerful classical processors.
That direction is particularly important for the development of quantum error correction and larger quantum computers, because the future of the field is expected to be hybrid: quantum and classical computing working together in real time.
Quantum Machines does not know which qubit technology will ultimately win the race, and it does not need to.
Its bet is different: no matter who builds the quantum processor of the future, someone will have to make it work, scheduling its operations, processing its measurements and responding to them at extraordinary speed.
In less than a decade, a company founded by three Israeli physicists who met in a laboratory in Rehovot has become one of the key infrastructure providers in the global quantum computing industry.
And if qubits are the muscles intended to give quantum computers their power, Quantum Machines wants to be the brain that teaches them how to work together.