Rigetti Computing, Inc.

Good day. Thank you for standing by and welcome to the Regality Computing First Quarter 2022 Earnings Conference Call-In Webcast. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Polly Pearson, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations at Sharon Merrill Associates. Please go ahead, ma'am.

Thank you, Operator, and good evening, everyone. Today, we'll be reviewing Rigetti's first quarter 2022 earnings results. With me here is Chad Rigetti, founder and CEO of Rigetti Computing, and Brian Cerita, CFO. Before I turn the call over, I'd like to point out that this call and Rigetti's Q1 press release contain forward-looking statements concerning current expectations, objectives, and underlying assumptions regarding future operating results. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those described. Also, in an effort to provide useful information to investors, comments today include non-GAAP financial measures. For details on these measures and reconciliations to comparable GAAP measures, and for further information regarding the factors that may affect Rigetti's future operating results, please refer to today's earnings release on Rigetti's website, at investors.rigetti.com or to the 8K filed with the SEC earlier today. And now I'll turn it over to Chad. Chad?

Thank you, Polly, and welcome everyone to our first quarter 2022 earnings call. As this is the first call we've held since our public debut, I'd like to first acknowledge the tremendous work from our team and support from our investors leading up to today. Thank you all. For those new to the Rigetti story, I'll start out with some background on our leadership in the industry. followed by the current state of quantum, our technology progress, and our business model for driving adoption. At Rigetti, we are on a mission to build the world's most powerful computers to help solve humanity's most important and pressing problems. We envision a world where drug development takes a fraction of the current time and more lives are saved, where affordable, clean energy is abundant, and where supply chain routes are fully optimized through the power of Rigetti's quantum cloud services platform. In the years ahead, we expect that it will be difficult to find an industry that quantum doesn't impact, and we are laser-focused on working to unlock this next frontier of economic opportunity. Today, Rigetti has offices in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia, with more than 50 technical PhDs from many of the world's most renowned universities. Our launch in 2013 marked the first-ever pure-play universal quantum computing startup, and we have gone on to achieve many trailblazing quantum firsts. and to help pioneer the quantum computing industry. In 2014, we patented a hybrid coprocessing architecture. The combination of this architecture and our superconducting approach has enabled us to achieve industry-leading speeds. Earlier this year, we demonstrated that our 80-qubit system is 18% faster than IBM's comparable 65-qubit system using IBM's own CLOPS, or circuit layer operations per second, speed metric. In 2017, We built the world's first dedicated quantum chip FAB right here in Silicon Valley, where I'm speaking from today. This capability, called FAB1, serves as the bedrock of our cutting-edge R&D infrastructure. In 2018, the first chemically accurate simulation on a cloud quantum computer was achieved by one of our customers using our machines. In 2019, we were one of three original hardware launch partners for Amazon Web Services' quantum computing service. In 2020, we were selected to build a commercial quantum computer in the United Kingdom. This is just one of several partnerships we're building in Europe as we continue to grow and expand our global operations. In 2021, we introduced the world's first modular scaling quantum chip. Today, this architecture serves as a foundation of our 80-qubit Aspen-M system, which is the largest quantum computer available on AWS. We believe Rigetti's wealth of quantum and engineering talent First mover advantages and state-of-the-art infrastructure give us a significant competitive edge and have allowed us to accumulate a robust IP portfolio with more than 140 patents issued and pending. Outside of our organization, Rigetti's reputation for quantum leadership continues to compound, helping us form deep partnerships with key public and private sector players in the quantum ecosystem. We see these collaborations as important markers of our progress. For example, We are working with Ampere Computing to unlock a new generation of machine learning applications through an integrated cloud platform. We're working with Deloitte and StrangeWorks to explore applications in material simulation, optimization, and machine learning with our scalable processors. We're partnering with Riverlane and Aztecs Pharmaceuticals to develop molecular simulations and explore drug discovery applications. We're collaborating with NASDAQ to explore quantum applications in fraud detection, order matching, and risk management. We're working with Standard Chartered Bank to advance quantum machine learning applications for finance and with Lawrence Livermore National Lab and the University of Southern California to solve important problems in fusion energy. While this is just a sampling of a partnership base, we find it to be illustrative of the broader emergence of quantum that is taking place. In short, organizations are waking up to quantum's promise and the need to engage with quantum companies. Today, the classical approach to computing faces limitations in solving certain high-value, computationally intensive problems, despite the power of several new advanced computing solutions. Many of these problems will always be intractable for classical computers. Quantum represents a different approach to building the powerful computers of tomorrow. By leveraging properties such as superposition and entanglement, quantum computers have the potential to deliver exponentially greater compute power than traditional machines. Similar to the rise of personal computing, mobile, and the Internet, it's hard to fully imagine the impact this may bring and the transformative potential that quantum computing holds. For example, today, modeling for drug development requires enormous computational power. Quantum has the potential to significantly reduce the cost of bringing new therapies to market. By helping us improve our understanding of material science, quantum could potentially aid in the development of next generation materials for consumer goods, industrial components, and medical applications. On the finance side, quantum computers have the potential to deliver faster market insights, to run more accurate models, and ultimately lead to better functioning markets overall. In addition, we believe the hybrid approach, combining advanced classical and quantum computing solutions, holds enormous potential for artificial intelligence. Simply put, We don't expect quantum computing to be an incremental improvement in computational horsepower. We expect it to be a phase change. Over the next decade, we expect one Rigetti quantum computer could be more powerful than the entire current global cloud. According to industry researchers, fault-tolerant quantum computers could ultimately produce up to an estimated $850 billion in annual value creation for end users and technology providers. We believe this opportunity is clearly significant. And we are laser-focused on advancing the science, technology, and solutions through our full-stack engineering approach to unlock this potential and bring quantum cloud services to the broad commercial market. At Regetti, we see progress occurring on an application-by-application basis, as quantum solutions achieve varying levels of progress across different industries and verticals over a given period of time. This view has informed our approach, both in terms of technology and the importance of early collaborations. On the technology side, we maintain three core principles. First, we are fully vertically integrated from chip design and manufacturing to the development of systems, software, and applications to cloud delivery. Second, we prioritize hybrid quantum classical computing in all aspects of our system architecture and cloud services business model. Third, we use the superconducting modality which is widely believed to be the most mature, most advanced, and most likely to lead to broad commercial success. Our quantum fab has become a key driver of our progress over the years, allowing us to advance beyond our humble beginning to compete with established tech giants in quantum. By owning and operating the means of quantum chip innovation and production, we have gained critical advantages in cycle time, testing infrastructure, and supply chain. Our capabilities in quantum chip manufacturing are also driving ongoing interest from academic and government institutions, emphasizing the strategic value of our fab and quantum expertise. I'll expand on some of these partnerships in just a moment. Turning to our technical approach, we are focused on three key pillars for advancing our machines, scale, speed, and fidelity. We have demonstrated leadership in both scaling and speed through our most recent quantum processor systems. For example, We believe we've cracked the code on scaling through our modular chip technology. This architecture took more than six years to develop, and as a result, we own more than 20 patents around this critical IP. We introduced this scaling technology in our Aspen M system, and we aim to use the same technology to continue scaling our machines going forward. As noted, we have achieved what we believe are industry-leading speeds on our machines, surpassing IBM as measured by their own internally developed metrics. Let's talk about fidelity. Today, it's broadly recognized that scale and fidelity are the key areas in which advancement is needed to run commercial quantum applications and unlock broader adoption. We believe that we are one of the leaders in scale and that we are also making clear progress in fidelity. First, multiple 15-qubit connected lattices on our Aspen-M system have demonstrated fidelities above 98%. making the machine competitive with other commercially available devices at that scale. Second, our next-generation chip design has displayed two-qubit gate fidelities as high as 99.5%, crossing what is believed to be a key threshold for commercial quantum computing. On that note, I'm excited to announce that we plan to release a single-chip 84-qubit quantum computer in 2023. This system will be based on our next-generation chip designed for higher fidelities and increased connectivity. We plan to combine the anticipated improvements of our 84-qubit processor with our modular multi-chip scaling technology of the Aspen-M to deliver a 336-qubit multi-chip processor later in 2023, representing a key interim milestone for the company. For our longer-term roadmap, we now plan to introduce our 1,000-plus qubit system in late 2025 and our 4,000-plus qubit system in or after 2027. We expect both systems to utilize the advantages of our multi-chip technology and next generation chip architecture similar to our 336 qubit multi-chip system. This updated timeline and roadmap is based on several factors, which include the following considerations. First, higher than anticipated labor, equipment, and system component costs are leading to increases in the costs associated with system development. Second, market and supply chain conditions have hampered the timely availability of input materials for our machines. Third, our available working capital coming out of our business combination close was lower than anticipated, which has limited our ability to absorb these increased costs and timing factors. Now, turning to our foundational cloud business model, which we refer to as quantum computing as a service, or QCaaS. We deliver access to our computers through our quantum cloud services platform and third-party cloud partnerships. Today, in addition to Regetti QCFs, our machines are available on AWS Bracket, on the Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility, and more. We expect the machines to soon be available on Microsoft Azure and Strangeworks. We're also accelerating quantum development and adoption through technology development services, which are more comprehensive partnerships with early adopters and sponsors in the public and private sectors. We provide these services under development contracts, which are multi-year and highly collaborative engagements, allowing us to advance our technology to generate revenue, and explore a broader spectrum of use cases. We already have won several key development contracts. For example, we provide quantum computing hardware, software, and benchmarks as part of the second phase of DARPA's program to develop quantum computers to solve complex optimization problems. We are the lead industry partner at the Superconducting Quantum Materials and Systems Center, or SQMS, led by the U.S. Department of Energy's Fermilab SQMS is one of the federal government's five national centers established to bring about transformational advances in quantum information science as part of the US National Quantum Initiative. And we were awarded a $3 million contract in partnership with Lawrence Livermore National Lab and the University of Southern California to work on advancing fusion energy, as noted earlier. In sum, as Regetti has made its public debut, our deep understanding and technical infrastructure already have been vetted by some of the most demanding users in the world. In conclusion, leading organizations are recognizing the potential of quantum to unlock the next frontier of advanced computing, and this has resulted in more activity in the space. We believe this is a positive, as it will lead to greater awareness, education, and action around quantum. With an established track record of success in advancing technology and forming partnerships, We believe Rigetti is well positioned to spearhead the continued development of Quantum going forward. With that, I would now like to turn the call over to our CFO, Brian Tereda, for a review of our financial results. Brian? Thanks, Chad.