France’s quantum computer maker Pasqal surges in Nasdaq debut

Aug 28 (Reuters) - Shares ‌of ​French ​quantum-computing company Pasqal surged around 60% in their Nasdaq debut ‌on Friday, signalling strong investor appetite ⁠for one of the sector’s newest public companies.

Pasqal ‌began trading after ‌merging with blank-cheque company Bleichroeder Acquisition Corp II in a transaction that valued ​it at about $2 billion before new funding. The deal left the ⁠loss-making company with approximately $360 million in cash to expand ​production, deploy more processors and pursue fault-tolerant quantum computing.

Its listing comes ​after President Donald Trump ‌ordered agencies to accelerate quantum technology development. The Commerce Department ⁠signed preliminary agreements for about $2 billion in incentives to nine quantum companies. Pasqal ⁠is not among them.

France is backing Pasqal through ​state bank Bpifrance, which participated in financing linked to the merger.

Quantum processors are being developed ‌to tackle specialised problems in fields such as drug discovery, ‌materials science and financial modelling, but ⁠persistent errors still ‌limit their ​reliability at scale.

(Reporting by Leo Marchandon in Gdansk, Editing by Louise ‌Heavens)

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