John Koetsier

Netherlands-based QuiX Quantum has delivered Carina, the world's first universal photonic quantum computer designed for customer deployment. Unlike most quantum machines, Carina operates at room temperature and fits into standard data center racks, utilizing single photons as qubits. This innovative system offers eight input and four computational photonic qubits, with plans for rapid scaling. Its "universal" nature means it can execute arbitrary gate-based quantum algorithms, a significant leap from previous special-purpose photonic devices. Carina employs a measurement-based architecture, translating gate-model algorithms into adaptive single-qubit measurements. Developed for the German Aerospace Center's Quantum Computing Initiative, this marks a crucial step towards integrating quantum computing into conventional IT environments, allowing organizations to build operational experience with quantum infrastructure. While currently for small-scale demonstrations, it lays the groundwork for future fault-tolerant systems.

Humanoid AI, a UK-based firm, is emerging as a significant European player in the humanoid robot market. Their HMND 01 robot primarily features a wheeled design, prioritizing industrial applications due to greater energy efficiency, stability, and easier CE certification compared to bipedal models. The company employs a four-layer AI architecture, from fleet coordination to whole-body control, leveraging vision-language models for deterministic task execution. Humanoid AI focuses on deploying flexible robot fleets capable of diverse tasks, aiming for performance exceeding human speed through reinforcement learning. Despite less capital than US competitors, strategic partnerships with Bosch and Schaeffler, and a commercial-first approach, position them for rapid growth and European manufacturing. They are expected to secure more funding soon.

In early July, Hyundai proudly showcased its Boston Dynamics Atlas robot kicking a soccer ball in the FIFA World Cup.

If my agent talks to yours, how do you know it's mine? How does your agent know? A new project might help with agentic ID ... and eventually trust.

We're not going to see factories with 10,000 humanoid robot workers. We will however, see more robots ... and some humanoids.

London-based Humanoid has become Europe's first pure-play humanoid robotics unicorn, raising a $152 million Series A at a $1.35 billion valuation. This funding brings their total to $270 million, with investments from Prime Movers Lab, Schaeffler, and Bosch, among others. The two-year-old company achieved rapid growth by developing its wheeled robot, HMND 01, and securing major deals, including a 1,000-robot order with Schaeffler and production capacity from Bosch for 100,000 units. Humanoid differentiates itself with a wheeled design, enabling quicker European certification compared to bipedal robots. This move signifies growing momentum for humanoid robotics in Europe, challenging the US and China. Their AI platform, KinetIQ, aims to integrate robots into industrial settings, with commercial pilots starting soon.

Europe has a new billion-dollar startup, and it's Humanoid, a two-year-old company headquartered in London that developed its humanoid robot, HMND 01, in near-record time.

Foundation says its new MK-2 Phantom humanoid robots will use AMD Ryzen chips. That's a shot across the bow of Nvidia, which supplies most AI chips.

AT&T is now using D-Wave's quantum computing to accelerate network optimization, cutting processing time from an hour to under 15 seconds. This 240x speedup demonstrates real-world quantum advantage for a major carrier. AT&T expanded its D-Wave agreement to tackle complex optimization across live network operations, covering traffic routing, load balancing, and resource allocation. This enables crucial real-time adjustments, overcoming classical computing's struggle with dynamic network conditions. D-Wave's CEO hailed this as a prime example of quantum solving real business challenges. The announcement coincided with D-Wave's Nasdaq debut, boosting its stock and other quantum firms.

A LexisNexis analysis reveals China holds the vast majority of humanoid robot patents, particularly in morphology, aligning with its strategic industrial policy. However, U.S. patents demonstrate superior individual quality and strength, placing America second in morphology portfolio value despite lower raw numbers. Chinese patent activity has surged across all key humanoid technologies in the past decade. The recent U.S. ban on foreign robots aims to foster domestic innovation and commercialization, potentially increasing U.S. patent quantity. This sets the stage for a bifurcated global race, with China leading in patent volume and the U.S. excelling in patent quality, though both nations are advancing in both aspects. American firms may still need to license Chinese IP.