IQM Lists on Nasdaq as Europe’s First Public Quantum Firm

IQM Quantum Computers began trading on the Nasdaq Global Select Market on Thursday under the ticker “IQMX,” becoming the first European quantum computing company to list on a major US exchange. The Espoo, Finland-based hardware maker reached the public market through a business combination with Real Asset Acquisition Corp. (RAAQ), a Princeton-based special purpose acquisition company, rather than a traditional initial public offering. The merger leaves IQM with a pro forma cash position of €337 million.

The deal structure keeps IQM headquartered in Finland with its existing institutional shareholders on the cap table, an arrangement chairman Sierk Poetting called “an acceleration” rather than a change of direction when the merger was first announced in February. The structure runs against a pattern in which many European tech companies previously had to reincorporate in Delaware or move to Silicon Valley to access major US capital, according to Tech Funding News.

How a Finnish Quantum Maker Reached Nasdaq

The business combination with RAAQ closed on July 1, and American Depositary Shares began trading on the Nasdaq Global Select Market the following day. IQM’s listing-day press release confirms the start of trading under the “IQMX” ticker. The transaction values IQM at a pre-money valuation of roughly $1.8 billion, according to Tech Funding News, and delivered about €406 million in gross cash, including approximately $146 million raised through a private investment in public equity (PIPE) round.

A second trading line follows on July 3: Nasdaq Helsinki approved IQM’s listing application, and 262,462,360 shares begin trading in Helsinki under the same “IQMX” ticker with market-making support. Finland’s Financial Supervisory Authority approved IQM’s Finnish-language prospectus on July 1, the day the SPAC merger closed.

The shareholder roster looks much the same as it did before the listing, consistent with earlier coverage of the deal. Finnish state-owned venture capital fund Tesi, pension insurer Varma, and pension insurer Elo remain invested through closing, and Ilmarinen, another Finnish pension insurer, joined the PIPE round. Current IQM shareholders kept their shares and did not take out cash, and all major shareholders agreed to standard lock-up terms at closing.

That ownership continuity is unusual for a US listing by a non-US company. Tom Henriksson, general partner at OpenOcean and an early IQM investor, called the deal “a landmark for European deep tech” and said it proves European companies “can stand tall on the world stage and access serious US public capital without relocating their core R&D or ambition.”

23 System Sales Put IQM Ahead

IQM’s pitch to public investors is built on a base its competitors struggle to match: actual system sales. The company’s listing-day press release says it has sold 23 quantum computers worldwide, more than any other quantum manufacturer. For 2025, IQM reported €31 million in revenue and an order backlog above €67 million, according to Tech Funding News.

The on-premises model drives those numbers. Rather than selling access to a remote cloud system, IQM ships full-stack superconducting machines to customers who own and operate them in their own facilities. The company calls this approach “Production Quantum,” and it puts IQM into a different revenue category than competitors still selling primarily through remote access. That makes its revenue line a more concrete number than most of its peers report.

The company’s earlier merger disclosures cited 21 systems sold to 13 customers and unaudited 2025 revenue of at least $35 million, with bookings and visibility exceeding $100 million. The 23-systems figure in the listing-day press release supersedes the earlier number.

Customers Across Three Continents

The customer roster spans the three regions where governments and large research institutions are spending real money on quantum infrastructure. In the United States, IQM is operating systems at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), and the company has opened its first Quantum Technology Center in Maryland as a hub for its North American expansion. The Maryland center is positioned as the company’s anchor for what the listing-day release calls “the heart of America’s quantum strategy.”

In Asia, IQM closed the first enterprise quantum computer purchase in Japan. Toyo Corporation, a Japanese technology distributor, acquired a full-stack 20-qubit system from IQM, with deployment planned by the end of 2026, per IQM’s Toyo Corporation announcement. The sale is described as a Japanese first: an enterprise (rather than research or government) buyer of a complete superconducting quantum computer.

Europe remains the deepest installation base. IQM systems are operational at CINECA, the Italian high-performance computing consortium, and at the Leibniz Supercomputing Center (LRZ) in Germany. The press release describes these deployments as positioning the company “as the trusted partner for the world’s most demanding research and computing environments.” Both installations predate the listing and form the core of IQM’s existing on-premises footprint on the continent.

These deployments share a pattern. Each is a national laboratory, supercomputing center, or major enterprise rather than a commercial cloud customer. IQM’s on-premises hardware model fits those buyers better than competitors selling remote access.

Fault Tolerance Drives the Cash Plan

The Nasdaq debut follows IQM’s recent technical announcement of a novel quantum error correction approach. The approach is built for superconducting hardware, where connecting distant qubits is hard. The company says it significantly reduces the hardware requirements for fault-tolerant quantum computing on near-term machines rather than on a future generation of processors. The work targets the same full-stack hardware efficiency that defines IQM’s broader engineering roadmap.

Quantum computing is reaching an inflection point. Around the world, organizations are moving from exploration to implementation, investing in quantum infrastructure and building the capabilities that will define the next generation of computing.

Fault tolerance is the field’s hardest unsolved engineering problem. Progress toward it is what quantum hardware companies need to demonstrate to justify their valuations. IQM says the cash from the listing will go directly toward developing fault-tolerant systems.

IQM’s Numbers Against Quantinuum’s

The wider quantum computing sector is now littered with public listings, and the comparisons are not all flattering for IQM. Honeywell’s Quantinuum filed for a traditional Nasdaq IPO in May with a target valuation of up to $20 billion. Quantinuum reported a $136.6 million net loss on $5.2 million in revenue for its most recent quarter. IonQ and Rigetti Computing, both already public and US-based, are also still unprofitable, according to Tech Funding News.

Quantinuum’s revenue base is thinner than IQM’s. The pattern is the conventional quantum IPO story: large headline valuations, small reported revenue, ongoing losses. Quantinuum, IonQ, and Rigetti all share that profile. IQM’s €31 million in 2025 revenue and €67 million order backlog put it in a different starting position from those rivals. Whether that translates into the kind of growth public investors want is the open question.

IQM’s numbers look different on the revenue line but face the same execution challenge. Whether the company can convert its 23 shipped systems into a recurring high-margin business is what investors will press on in coming quarters.

Finnish Ownership Held Through the Listing

Keeping the headquarters in Espoo has real operational value for IQM. The company employs over 400 people and operates across Europe, Asia, and North America, with major operations in Munich. The dual listing on Nasdaq Helsinki gives Finnish retail investors a direct route to the stock under their home-market rules. It also keeps IQM close to its European workforce and the customer relationships it has built on the continent.

The ownership continuity is the more unusual piece. Tesi, Varma, and Elo did not sell any shares into the listing, and Ilmarinen joined the PIPE. That keeps the Finnish pension and state capital base aligned with the company’s public-market trajectory. Sierk Poetting, chairman of IQM’s board, said when the merger was announced in February that the listing is “not a change of direction but is rather an acceleration.” That pattern of institutional continuity through a US listing is rare among European tech companies.

The structure of the deal is a test case for the next European quantum company weighing the same choice.

Tom Henriksson, OpenOcean’s general partner and an early IQM investor, called the listing “a landmark for European deep tech.” Finland’s state-owned Tesi and the country’s pension insurers Varma, Elo, and Ilmarinen now own a piece of that experiment in public form. For context on a peer European quantum hardware player, see Quobly’s €115M silicon quantum bet.

Disclaimer: This article is informational only and not financial advice. Quantum computing is an emerging technology sector with significant risks. Consult a qualified financial professional before any investment decision.