Rigetti Computing

Overview

Rigetti Computing is a US pure-play quantum company that designs its own superconducting chips and manufactures them in its own fabrication facility. It sells access through the cloud and sells complete on-premises systems, from the 9-qubit Novera to the 108-qubit Cepheus class, mainly to national laboratories and quantum computing centers.

The company's defining technical idea is modularity. Instead of building one large, fragile chip, Rigetti tiles several small chips, called chiplets, into a larger processor. Smaller chips are easier to manufacture with high quality, and the company argues this offers a practical path to systems with 1,000 or more qubits.

History and background

Rigetti was founded in 2013 by Chad Rigetti, a physicist who had worked at IBM Research, and was one of the first startups to build superconducting quantum processors along with its own fabrication line. It launched a cloud platform, Forest, in 2017, combining quantum hardware with the Quil instruction language and the pyQuil library. It went public on Nasdaq in March 2022 through a merger with a special purpose acquisition company, Supernova Partners Acquisition Company II.

Subodh Kulkarni has led the company as CEO since late 2022. Since then Rigetti has focused on fidelity and modularity, introducing the 9-qubit Novera QPU for on-premises use in December 2023 and the 84-qubit Ankaa-3 in late 2024, followed by the four-chiplet Cepheus-1-36Q in 2025 and the twelve-chiplet Cepheus-1-108Q in 2026.

How the technology works

Rigetti's qubits are superconducting circuits cooled to a few hundredths of a degree above absolute zero. Its chips use tunable transmon qubits, whose frequencies can be adjusted so that pairs of qubits can be brought into resonance to perform two-qubit gates. The company reports a median two-qubit gate fidelity of 99.8% with gate times of 40 nanoseconds on a 9-qubit chip, using a scheme it calls an adiabatic CZ gate.

The chiplet approach is the important part. Each 9-qubit chiplet is fabricated and tested separately, then joined to others in a multi-chip package. Cepheus-1-36Q uses four chiplets and Cepheus-1-108Q uses twelve. The challenge is that fidelity tends to fall as chiplets are combined. In January 2026 Rigetti reported median two-qubit fidelities of about 99.7% on its 9-qubit system, 99.6% on the 36-qubit system, and 99% on the 108-qubit system, and it has set a target of a 99.5% median on the 108-qubit machine by the end of 2026.

According to summaries of the company's Q2 2026 earnings call, management said the 108-qubit system is currently limited by coherence times of about 25 to 30 microseconds, and that materials work aims to double or triple that. The longer-term target is roughly 1,000 qubits at 99.9% fidelity within about three years, and the company has begun investing in dilution refrigeration for systems of that size.

Products and platforms

Processors in our Hardware Database

• Rigetti Novera QPU — 9 qubits, released 2023 (introduced December 2023; shipping from early 2024)

Key milestones

Strengths and challenges

Strengths

• Owns the full stack, from chip fabrication to control electronics, cloud access, and software.
• A modular chiplet architecture that offers a credible route to larger systems.
• Very fast gates, about 40 nanoseconds on the 9-qubit chip, with high fidelity on small systems.
• International customers, including India's C-DAC, and a balance sheet with no debt as of Q1 2026.

Challenges and open questions

• Fidelity falls as chiplets are combined, and the 108-qubit system is still working toward its 99.5% target.
• Coherence times of roughly 25 to 30 microseconds limit circuit depth.
• Schedule risk: the 108-qubit system's general availability was pushed back from its original 2025 target.
• Revenue is small and lumpy because it depends on system sales that are recognized when deliveries are completed.

Why it matters

Rigetti shows how the small-chips, big-system idea plays out in practice. If chiplets can be combined without losing fidelity, quantum computers might scale the way modern classical processors do, by assembling many well-tested components. If fidelity keeps falling as systems grow, that path gets harder, and the company's progress on the 108-qubit machine over the next year will be an important data point.

For readers in India, Rigetti's C-DAC order is notable. Management has described it as a sign of national-level interest in superconducting platforms in India, and it will put a 108-qubit system into a national computing institution once installation and acceptance testing are complete.

Latest news

• Rigetti says three system deliveries are still targeted for 2026, including the 108-qubit system for C-DAC in India, and reports a Department of Commerce letter of intent for up to 100 million dollars in potential funding — August 2026
• Management targets a median two-qubit fidelity of about 99.5% on Cepheus-1-108Q by the end of 2026 — August 2026
• Rigetti appoints David Rivas as Chief Operating Officer and Andrew Bestwick as Chief Technology Officer — 2026
• Cepheus-1-108Q becomes generally available on Rigetti QCS, Amazon Braket, Azure Quantum, and qBraid — 2026

Frequently asked questions

This profile is written for educational purposes and summarizes public announcements, company filings, and published research. Last reviewed: September 30, 2026. It is not investment advice. Check the company's official channels for the latest figures and claims.

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