Dr Trevor Lanting is chief development officer at D-Wave Quantum, one of the earliest companies to commercialise quantum computing systems. He leads research and product development, with a focus on deploying quantum technologies into real-world enterprise use cases. 

The following points summarise the key themes for corporate venture investors that emerged from their discussion.

  • Quantum is already commercial in narrow domains
    • Contrary to the prevailing narrative, parts of quantum computing are no longer purely experimental. 
    • D-Wave’s annealing systems are in production use, with customers running live optimisation workloads and reportedly achieving measurable ROI. 
    • Around 100 customers are already engaging with the platform, suggesting early but tangible market traction. 
  • Clear near-term use case: optimisation problems
    • The most mature applications sit in “quantum optimisation” — logistics, supply chains, scheduling and resource allocation. 
    • Example: an automotive manufacturer reduced optimisation time for production scheduling from ~30 minutes to under five, while handling greater complexity.
    • These are high-frequency, high-value enterprise problems, making them attractive early entry points for venture-backed solutions. 
  • Divergence in quantum technology pathways
    • Two main approaches are emerging: 
      • Annealing (commercial today, optimisation-focused) 
      • Gate-model (longer-term, with potential in chemistry and materials simulation)
    • Investors should treat “quantum” as a heterogeneous space rather than a single market. 
  • The “killer app” remains ahead — but visible
    • Longer-term value is expected in quantum chemistry and materials discovery (e.g. drug discovery, advanced materials). 
    • These areas remain in R&D but could unlock step-change innovation if technical hurdles are cleared. 
  • Enterprise readiness is a gating factor
    • Adoption depends less on hardware and more on: 
      • Identification of hard optimisation problems 
      • Availability of structured data 
      • Internal or external expertise to formulate problems 
    • Tooling is improving rapidly (e.g., Python-based frameworks), lowering barriers to entry. 
  • Professional services and application layers are critical
    • Many successful deployments rely on close collaboration with vendor teams. 
    • This suggests a near-term opportunity for startups in: 
      • Application development 
      • Middleware / orchestration 
      • Verticalised solutions for specific industries 
  • Quantum and AI are complementary not competing
    • Quantum is positioned as a way to alleviate compute bottlenecks in AI, particularly in optimisation and sampling tasks. 
    • Potential benefits include: 
      • Reduced training/inference costs 
      • More efficient model architectures 
    • Hybrid quantum-classical models are already being explored (e.g. in drug discovery workflows). 
  • Infrastructure convergence is coming quickly
    • Quantum systems are expected to integrate into existing compute stacks alongside CPUs and GPUs, akin to accelerators. 
    • Early deployments are already appearing in high-performance computing centres. 
    • Timeline for deeper integration could be within two years, indicating a faster-than-expected infrastructure cycle. 
  • Geopolitics and defence demand are tailwinds
    • Quantum computing is increasingly viewed as a strategic technology with national security implications. 
    • Defence applications (logistics, optimisation, cyber) are emerging as early adopters. 
    • This dynamic is likely to sustain government funding and accelerate ecosystem development. 
  • Cybersecurity impact is long-term but evolving
    • While breaking current encryption (e.g., via Shor’s algorithm) remains distant, nearer-term applications include: 
      • Improved threat detection 
      • Enhanced AI-driven security models 
    • Investors should distinguish between hype (encryption risk) and nearer-term value creation. 
  • Investment focus: applications over hardware (for now)
    • The strongest near-term opportunities lie in: 
      • Application-layer companies 
      • Enterprise integration and tooling 
      • Sector-specific optimisation solutions 
    • Hardware remains capital intensive and technically uncertain, though strategically important. 

Bottom line

Quantum computing is transitioning from speculative to selectively practical. For corporate venture investors, the immediate opportunity lies not in backing core hardware platforms, but in enabling enterprise adoption — particularly in optimisation-heavy industries where ROI can already be demonstrated. 

This summary was generated by AI and lightly edited by GCV staff.