The federal DeepTech & Climate Fund (DTCF) is investing around €10 million in the quantum computing startup planqc, which was established in 2022. The startup in Garching near Munich, which is a spin-off from the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics, develops highly scalable quantum computers for applications that are relevant for business.

Dr Anna Christmann, Commissioner of the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action for the Digital Industry and Startups, said: The success story of planqc shows that today’s innovative research can generate tomorrow’s promising enterprises which strengthen our long-term competitiveness. We are proud that our ongoing commitment to an innovation-friendly environment and easier access to venture capital is bearing fruit, and we are constantly working to further improve the startup ecosystems in Germany and Europe.

Together with investors with a long-term orientation such as Family Offices, in the coming years the DTCF is investing up to €1 billion in startups with business models with a long-term development and commercialisation cycle and high financing needs. Funded by the Future Fund and the ERP Special Fund, the DTCF offers important growth prospects for innovative technology startups in Germany and Europe and produces tomorrow’s new technology-based SMEs.

The DTCF is one of several building blocks of the €10 billion federal Future Fund. The aim of the Future Fund is to considerably expand venture capital funding until 2030 and beyond by means of public funds which always need to be invested together with private funds. In light of the Fund’s different building blocks, innovative technology startups in their growth phase benefit especially greatly from the Future Fund. In addition to funds made available by the Future Fund, funds from the ERP Special Fund, the EIF, KfW/KfW Capital and in particular from private investors help to mobilise substantially more capital for investment. Ten building blocks of the Future Fund have already been launched and further building blocks are being prepared.