April 19, 2024

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Samsung Electronics has been relentlessly seeking breakthrough technologies beyond smartphones and semiconductors. In its latest effort to seek new technologies, its investment arm Samsung NEXT has invested in US startup Aliro Technologies.

The startup is a spinoff of Havard’s Quantum Information Sciences Lab that aims to make quantum computing more accessible to users -- developers, researchers and hardware makers. Led by CEO Kim Ricotta and co-founder and Chief Technology Officer Prineha Narang, Aliro develops a hardware-independent tool for developers of quantum algorithms and applications.

The startup’s solutions help developers build software for quantum computers without the hardware.

“We believe quantum computing is going to fundamentally change the paradigm and radically impact many industries,” Samsung NEXT said in a statement,

“We think that Aliro’s software which makes quantum computing as accessible as classical computing will bring about a huge change.”

Samsung’s investment unit did not disclose the exact amount of the investment, but the startup has announced that it had raised a combined $2.7 million seed round led by Flybridge Capital Partners, Crosslink Ventures and Samsung NEXT’s Q Fund.

Q Fund, an early-stage venture fund focused on artificial intelligence startups, was launched in June, 2018. The company explained that the latest investment decision in the quantum computing segment was made because it believes quantum computing, like AI, could be utilized to solve problems in society.

The global quantum computing market is expected to grow 37.3 percent a year through 2022 and the market size will reach $161 million during the same period, according to market research firm BCC Research.

By Kim Young-won (wone0102@heraldcorp.com)