Pasqal has made a breakthrough: a photonic chip has for the first time held atom qubits.
French company Pasqal has reached a significant milestone in the development of quantum computing: for the first time, it has managed to control neutral atoms using laser light generated and routed directly on a photonic integrated circuit. This is the first such result for neutral-atom quantum computers, and it opens new horizons for scaling this promising technology.
In the experiment, a single photonic chip formed four independently controlled optical traps, which successfully held four rubidium atoms. This is not just a technical demonstration, but an important step toward overcoming one of the main barriers to creating large-scale quantum systems.
Why moving optics onto a chip is critically important
Neutral-atom quantum computers use focused laser beams—so-called optical tweezers—to capture and manipulate individual atoms that act as qubits. Traditionally, a significant portion of this optical system consists of bulky external components. As the number of atoms increases, this architecture becomes increasingly complex and expensive to scale, turning into a bottleneck for the entire technology.
Pasqal is addressing this problem by moving part of the optical infrastructure onto photonic integrated circuits. The experimental results are impressive: the performance of the chip-based system proved comparable to traditional optics, with the lifetime of trapped atoms reaching about 27.5 seconds. This demonstrates that integrated photonics can ensure stable qubit operation without loss of quality.
From four atoms to thousands
Of course, four atoms is not yet a full-fledged quantum processor. However, it is precisely the optical infrastructure that becomes the main obstacle when scaling neutral-atom technology. Pasqal aims to use integrated photonics in future systems with more than 10,000 atoms and 100 logical qubits. This approach will significantly simplify the optical part of the processor and bring the production of quantum systems closer to a more scalable architecture.
To develop this photonic chip, Pasqal leveraged technologies from its subsidiary Aeponyx, acquired in 2025. This acquisition was strategically aimed at integrating photonic circuits into Pasqal's hardware platform and accelerating the transition to fault-tolerant quantum computing. It is worth recalling that Pasqal, in partnership with Saudi Aramco, previously launched the first quantum computer in Saudi Arabia, underscoring its ambitions on a global scale.
My analysis: This breakthrough is not just a technical novelty, but a signal that neutral-atom quantum computers are becoming a real contender in the race for quantum supremacy. The successful integration of photonics on a chip reduces the cost and complexity of systems, which is critical for the commercialization of the technology in the coming years. If Pasqal manages to scale this approach to thousands of qubits, we may witness a paradigm shift in quantum computing.