Analysis
Q-CTRL, the Sydney-based quantum infrastructure software company, closed a US$290 million (A$415 million) Series C on November 12, 2026, led by Salesforce Ventures.
Australia's National Reconstruction Fund Corporation said the round valued Q-CTRL at more than US$1 billion, making it Australia's first quantum unicorn, per Bushletter.
The company's release, carried by HPCwire, says the Series C saw two expansions to meet investor demand. Neither Q-CTRL nor the NRFC disclosed a more precise valuation.
“On capital raised, the Series C alone is about 2.6 times the $113 million the company raised across its entire expanded Series B.”
What does Q-CTRL do?
Q-CTRL describes itself on its website as "the pioneer in AI-powered quantum infrastructure software," and says Airbus, Lockheed Martin, IBM and defense agencies in the US, UK and Australia work with it. Michael J. Biercuk is the founder and CEO. Its marquee product, per the HPCwire release, is Ironstone Opal, a quantum navigation system the company calls unjammable, unspoofable and undetectable, being deployed on commercial aircraft and autonomous vehicles. Bushletter reports Ironstone Opal is deployed on commercial aircraft with Airbus and on autonomous platforms with Lockheed Martin, that the two companies are collaborating on quantum navigation sensors under DARPA's RoQS program, and that Q-CTRL's software ran a materials simulation on the IBM Quantum Platform. The company plans to spend the money on global expansion, its quantum infrastructure platform, and commercializing quantum computing and sensing products, including its aviation and autonomous systems programs.
Value Add VC data
- Jul 2019, Series A -- amount not stated; Q-CTRL's 2021 Series B release describes it as oversubscribed (Q-CTRL)
- Nov 2021, Series B -- $25M, led by Airbus Ventures (Q-CTRL)
- Oct 2024, Series B expansion -- Series B total raised to $113M (A$166M), led by GP Bullhound (The Quantum Insider)
- Nov 2026, Series C -- $290M (A$415M) at more than $1B, led by Salesforce Ventures (HPCwire)
We could not verify a prior Q-CTRL valuation, so there is no markup multiple to report. On capital raised, the Series C alone is about 2.6 times the $113 million the company raised across its entire expanded Series B.
Who invested in Q-CTRL?
Salesforce Ventures led, with significant participation from Bullhound Capital and Affinity Partners, per HPCwire. New investors were Affinity Partners, AMD Ventures, EDGE Group, MPower Partners, Australia's National Reconstruction Fund Corporation and SPARX Asset Management. Returning investors were Alpha Edison, Alumni Ventures, Bullhound Capital, DCVC, In-Q-Tel, Lockheed Martin Ventures, Main Sequence, Ridgeline, Salesforce Ventures, Salus Ventures and Square Peg. Bushletter reports the NRFC took a A$70 million equity stake, the federal government's most substantial direct investment in quantum technology. Bullhound Capital's Per Roman said in the HPCwire release that Q-CTRL has "real customers and real revenue," though no revenue figure was released. The 2024 Series B expansion was led by a firm The Quantum Insider names GP Bullhound; the 2026 release names Bullhound Capital, and we use each source's name.
Deep-tech rounds outside the US this week
Q-CTRL's round lands in a week when Pulse covered two other large non-US deep-tech financings:
- Fractile -- confirmed a $720M Series C, with its valuation reported near $7B (Pulse)
- Agile Robots -- $500M round at an $8.5B valuation, led by SoftBank with Nvidia joining (Pulse)
Q-CTRL's reported mark of more than $1B is below both.
Q-CTRL risks and what to watch
The valuation rests on one sentence from a government investor, "more than US$1 billion," with no figure from the company. The revenue that Bullhound Capital cites is unquantified. And the business has two engines with very different clocks: navigation sold to aerospace and defense buyers now, and quantum computing software whose market depends on how fast hardware matures. The investor list leans toward the first: AMD Ventures is the only chip investor among the new names, while In-Q-Tel, Lockheed Martin Ventures and EDGE Group are defense and intelligence money. The next proof point is a disclosed Ironstone Opal production contract with Airbus or Lockheed Martin, with a dollar value attached.