IONQ Inc (IONQ) 2021 Q4 法說會逐字稿

Greetings. Welcome to the IonQ fourth-quarter 2021 earnings call. (Operator Instructions) Please note this conference is being recorded.

大家好！歡迎參加 IonQ 2021 年第四季財報電話會議。 （操作員指示）請注意，本次會議正在錄製中。

I will now turn the conference over to your host, Jordan Shapiro, VP of Financial Planning and Analysis and Head of Investor Relations. Thank you. You may begin.

現在，我將會議交給主持人喬丹·夏皮羅（Jordan Shapiro），他是財務規劃與分析副總裁兼投資者關係主管。謝謝。您可以開始了。

Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to IonQ's fourth-quarter and full-year 2021 earnings call. My name is Jordan Shapiro, and I'm the Vice President of Financial Planning and Analysis and Head of Investor Relations here at IonQ.

大家下午好，歡迎參加 IonQ 2021 年第四季及全年財報電話會議。我叫喬丹‧夏皮羅 (Jordan Shapiro)，是 IonQ 財務規劃與分析副總裁兼投資人關係主管。

I am pleased to be joined on today's call by Peter Chapman, IonQ's President and Chief Executive Officer; and Thomas Kramer, our Chief Financial Officer. By now everyone should have access to the company's fourth-quarter and full-year 2021 earnings press release issued this afternoon, which is available on the Investor Relations section of our website at investors.ionq.com.

我很高興IonQ總裁兼執行長Peter Chapman和財務長Thomas Kramer出席今天的電話會議。現在，大家應該已經可以閱讀公司今天下午發布的2021年第四季和全年業績新聞稿，該新聞稿可在我們網站investors.ionq.com的投資者關係板塊查閱。

Please note that on today's call, management will refer to adjusted EBITDA, which is a non-GAAP financial measure. While the company believes this non-GAAP financial measure provides useful information for investors, the presentation of this information is not intended to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for the financial information presented in accordance with GAAP. You are directed to our press release for a reconciliation of such measures to GAAP.

請注意，在今天的電話會議上，管理階層將提及調整後的EBITDA，這是一個非GAAP財務指標。雖然公司認為該非GAAP財務指標為投資者提供了有用的信息，但這些資訊的呈現並非旨在單獨考慮或取代根據GAAP呈現的財務資訊。您可以參閱我們的新聞稿，以了解此類指標與GAAP的對帳情況。

Now before we begin, please note that some of our remarks on this call will be forward-looking. Therefore, please refer to the cautionary statement in today's press release for additional details about these remarks. Please note that these forward-looking statements made during this conference call speak only as of today. Now, I will turn it over to Peter Chapman, President and CEO of IonQ. Peter?

在開始之前，請注意，我們在本次電話會議中的一些言論將具有前瞻性。因此，請參閱今天新聞稿中的警示性聲明，以了解更多有關這些言論的詳細資訊。請注意，本次電話會議中的這些前瞻性陳述僅截至今天有效。現在，我將把時間交給 IonQ 總裁兼執行長 Peter Chapman。 Peter？

Thanks, Jordan, and thank you all for joining us today. I first want to acknowledge the deeply troubling crisis still unfolding in Ukraine. It's a time of great concern for all of us, and it is simply devastating to see the impact it's having on the lives of so many people, including some of our IonQ staff members who have family in harms' way.

謝謝喬丹，也謝謝大家今天加入我們。首先，我想承認烏克蘭危機仍在持續發酵，令人深感不安。這是一個令我們所有人都深感憂慮的時刻，看到它對如此多的人的生活造成的影響，包括一些家人身處險境的IonQ員工，真是令人心碎。

Before I get started, I thought I would share a little history of IonQ. When I joined IonQ three years ago, the Board told me to ignore sales, ignore the competition, and ignore the press. Just focus on building the world's best quantum computer and bring it to market as quickly as you can. In some sense, a field-of-dreams approach: if you build it, they will come.

在開始之前，我想先分享一下 IonQ 的歷史。三年前我加入 IonQ 時，董事會告訴我，不要考慮銷售、競爭和媒體報導。只需專注於打造世界上最好的量子計算機，並儘快將其推向市場。從某種意義上來說，這是一種「夢想成真」的方法：只要你造出來，他們就會來。

And that's just what we believe we have done. We believe we have built the world's best quantum computer as shown in our latest generation IonQ Aria machine. I tell you this story because it's important to understand where IonQ is in its commercialization efforts and the upside to come. At the beginning of 2021, we had no dedicated sales executives, and we're selling two 11-qubit machines.

這正是我們堅信自己已經做到的。我們相信，我們已經打造了世界上最好的量子計算機，正如我們最新一代的 IonQ Aria 機器所展現的那樣。我之所以講述這個故事，是因為它有助於我們了解 IonQ 在商業化方面的進展以及未來的潛力。 2021 年初，我們還沒有專門的銷售主管，目前銷售的是兩台 11 量子位元的機器。

Now having finished 2021, I am happy to report that even after tripling our original 2021 contract bookings forecast in September from $5 million to $15 million, we beat that number again to end up at $16.7 million for the full year. This resulted in recognized revenue of $2.1 million for the 2022 fiscal year, which was 31% above the $1.6 million we forecasted on the Q3 call.

2021年已過，我很高興地告訴大家，即使在9月份我們將2021年合約預訂額預測從500萬美元增加到1500萬美元，增幅達三倍之後，我們仍然再次超越了這一數字，全年最終達到1670萬美元。這使得2022財年的確認收入達到210萬美元，比我們在第三季電話會議上預測的160萬美元高出31%。

This year, we are starting to stand up our production engineering and manufacturing departments. This group will be responsible for building all commercial quantum computers going forward, including for the first time, selling systems outright to customers, which we anticipate could start shipping as early as 2023.

今年，我們將開始組成生產工程和製造部門。該部門將負責未來所有商用量子電腦的構建，包括首次將系統直接出售給客戶，我們預計最早可能在 2023 年開始出貨。

In our outlook today, we have not included any upside related to scaling the sales of these machines. We believe that over the next two years, one or two system sales could push our combined TCV contract bookings over nine figures for the three-year period from 2021 to 2023. That said, the quantum industry is nascent, making it hard to predict which quarter particular sales contracts will land. As a result, we expect our contract bookings in the near term to continue to be very lumpy.

在我們今天的展望中，我們並未考慮這些機器銷售擴大所帶來的任何好處。我們相信，在未來兩年內，一兩台系統的銷售就可能推動我們在2021年至2023年三年期間的TCV合約訂單總額超過九位數。話雖如此，量子產業尚處於起步階段，因此很難預測哪個季度的銷售合約會最終落地。因此，我們預計短期內我們的合約訂單量將繼續波動。

In 2022, we expect to more than double our sales staff, including our first salespeople in Europe. We are now selling our recently announced Aria machines that are more than 1,000 times more powerful than last year's model.

2022年，我們預期銷售人員規模將增加一倍以上，其中包括我們在歐洲的首批銷售人員。我們目前正在銷售最近發布的Aria機器，其性能比去年的型號強1000多倍。

Our forecast for fiscal '22 expects our 2022 revenue to be over $10 million at the midpoint, which will be approximately five times our 2021 revenue. We estimate full-year 2022 bookings at $22 million at the midpoint. This represents a $7 million or 47% increase over our original forecast, which we set out before going public and a 32% increase from our outstanding 2021 results. Thomas Kramer, our Chief Financial Officer, will go over the rest of our financials in detail shortly.

我們對2022財年的預測是，我們預計2022年的營收中位數將超過1,000萬美元，約為2021年營收的五倍。我們預計2022年全年的預訂量中位數將達到2,200萬美元。這比我們最初在上市前提出的預測高出700萬美元，增幅達47%，也比我們2021年的優異業績高出32%。我們的財務長Thomas Kramer稍後將詳細介紹我們其他的財務數據。

On the technology side, in February, we took a leap forward, not just for IonQ, but for the quantum computing industry as a whole. We announced the performance results for our latest generation Aria machine. This system achieved a record 20 algorithm of qubits, with the independent industry benchmarks from the QED-C, showing that Aria clearly outpaces every commercially available quantum compute solution today. We are confident that IonQ systems are the best in the world and that we are only furthering our lead.

在技​​術方面，我們在今年二月取得了飛躍，這不僅體現在IonQ的研發上，也體現在整個量子運算產業。我們公佈了最新一代Aria機器的效能結果。該系統實現了創紀錄的20個量子位元演算法，並根據QED-C的獨立產業基準測試，顯示Aria的性能明顯優於目前所有商用的量子計算解決方案。我們堅信IonQ系統是全球領先的，而且我們將繼續鞏固領先地位。

Last week, we were excited to announce that Microsoft customers can leverage the power of IonQ's Aria series quantum computer on Microsoft Azure. We expect this will unlock the creativity of Microsoft application developers worldwide.

上週，我們非常高興地宣布，微軟客戶可以在 Microsoft Azure 上充分利用 IonQ Aria 系列量子電腦的強大功能。我們期待這將釋放全球微軟應用程式開發者的創造力。

IonQ Aria is only one part of the story. As part of our plan to scale IonQ quantum computers beyond Aria, we announced in December that we plan to build new systems using barium qubits. Barium qubits have the potential to enable lower error rates and higher gate fidelities, which in turn could lead to more accurate and powerful quantum computers. They can also be controlled by visible light lasers, as opposed to ultraviolet lasers we use in our ytterbium systems. We believe visible light lasers could result in cheaper, more readily accessible components, and a promise of faster gate speeds.

IonQ Aria 只是故事的一部分。作為我們計劃將 IonQ 量子電腦擴展到 Aria 以外的計劃的一部分，我們在 12 月宣布計劃使用鋇量子位元來建立新系統。鋇量子位元有望實現更低的錯誤率和更高的閘保真度，從而帶來更精確、更強大的量子電腦。它們也可以由可見光雷射控制，而不是我們在鐿系統中使用的紫外線雷射。我們相信，可見光雷射可以帶來更便宜、更易於取得的組件，並有望實現更快的門速度。

Another crucial advantage of barium qubits is that they're easier to network together over long distances. Networking quantum systems together is key to making them more powerful and eventually to building a quantum Internet.

鋇量子位元的另一個關鍵優勢是它們更容易在長距離上連網。將量子系統聯網是增強其性能並最終建立量子互聯網的關鍵。

In summary, while Aria is leading the pack with its ytterbium qubits, we believe the addition of barium qubits to power our systems could further our lead in system performance. We believe our investment in barium qubits is already paying off. Earlier this month, we published data from the forthcoming barium-based system showing a 13-fold improvement in state preparation and measurement error, lovingly known as SPAM error in the industry, one of the key limitations to scaling quantum computers. Expect more exciting news to come from our barium systems later this year.

總而言之，雖然 Aria 憑藉鐿量子比特領先業界，但我們相信，引入鋇量子位元來驅動我們的系統可以進一步鞏固我們在系統性能方面的領先地位。我們相信，我們對鋇量子比特的投資已經獲得了回報。本月初，我們發布了即將推出的鋇基系統的數據，顯示狀態準備和測量誤差（業內親切地稱為 SPAM 誤差）改善了 13 倍，這是量子電腦擴展的關鍵限制因素之一。期待今年晚些時候，我們的鋇系統將帶來更多令人興奮的消息。

Given the state of the global supply chain, a natural follow-up question might be, where do we get enough barium qubits to serve our needs? In February, we announced the results of our public-private partnership with the US Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory to secure a constant supply of barium atoms for our computers. We could not be more thrilled to be working with the esteemed scientists and engineers over at PNNL to make barium-based quantum computers a reality.

鑑於全球供應鏈的現狀，一個自然的後續問題可能是：我們從哪裡獲得足夠的鋇量子位元來滿足我們的需求？今年2月，我們宣布了與美國能源部太平洋西北國家實驗室（PNNL）公私合作的成果，以確保我們電腦所需的鋇原子持續供應。我們非常高興能與PNNL的傑出科學家和工程師們攜手合作，讓鋇基量子電腦成為現實。

Next, let's talk about our research and development progress since our last conference call. Last month, IonQ announced that together with researchers from Duke University, we outlined a novel method of running a new set of N-qubit quantum gates that operate on many qubits in a single step, including the well-known Toffoli gate. We expect N-qubit gates to lead to substantial breakthroughs in quantum algorithms, making them more efficient and powerful with fewer operations.

接下來，我們來談談自上次電話會議以來的研發進展。上個月，IonQ 宣布與杜克大學的研究人員合作，概述了一種運行一組新的 N 量子位元量子閘的新方法，這些量子閘可以在一個步驟中對多個量子位元進行操作，其中包括著名的 Toffoli 閘。我們期待 N 量子比特閘能為量子演算法帶來重大突破，使其更有效率、更強大，運算次數也更少。

What's more this new family of gates can only be run on the proprietary architecture exclusive to our trapped ion computers. Our platform has the most algorithm of qubits in the industry, and now we're enabling those qubits to do even more. We expect these gates to be essential to work across applications such as quantum chemistry optimization and machine learning.

更重要的是，這一系列新的閘門只能在我們專屬的離子阱電腦架構上運作。我們的平台擁有業界最多的量子位元演算法，現在我們正在賦能這些量子比特，使其發揮更大的作用。我們預計這些閘將成為量子化學優化和機器學習等應用的關鍵。

Last, let me discuss our progress on real-world quantum applications with customers. In January, we were thrilled to announce a new partnership with Hyundai to develop quantum algorithms to simulate battery chemistry for electric vehicles. This work has the potential to greatly enhance charging, discharging, durability, capacity, and safety of batteries.

最後，我想與客戶討論我們在實際量子應用上的進展。今年一月，我們非常高興地宣布與現代汽車建立新的合作關係，共同開發用於模擬電動車電池化學反應的量子演算法。這項工作有望大幅提升電池的充電、放電性能、耐用性、容量和安全性。

With electric vehicle adoption increasing all over the world, battery development is a critical component in the transition to a more sustainable mobility. The Hyundai partnership follows a series of projects on quantum chemistry at IonQ. We have previously announced the work with Dow Chemical to demonstrate an end-to-end pipeline for simulating molecules, such as those present in fertilizer creation. Our work with Dow was an extension of previous IonQ efforts to simulate water molecules with our quantum computers.

隨著電動車在全球的普及，電池開發是向更永續的出行方式轉型的關鍵環節。與現代汽車的合作是 IonQ 公司一系列量子化學計畫的基礎。我們先前已宣布與陶氏化學合作，以展示用於模擬分子（例如肥料生產中存在的分子）的端到端流程。我們與陶氏的合作是 IonQ 公司先前利用量子電腦模擬水分子的延伸。

The Hyundai project shows the natural progression of tackling increasingly complex molecules with each project. We believe the experience we gain from manipulating molecules and the new Hyundai partnership will be broadly applicable in related fields, such as drug discovery and materials development.

現代專案展現了每個專案應對日益複雜分子的自然進程。我們相信，我們在分子操控方面累積的經驗以及與現代公司的新合作關係將廣泛應用於藥物研發和材料開發等相關領域。

In summary, we have confidence in our 2022 contract bookings forecast of $22 million. As we are getting ready to sell full systems over the next couple of years, we believe there is potential for significant upside for the next 24-month period. Our team is filling out nicely with top talent joining both at the executive and individual contributor level. We're focusing special attention on scaling our sales force.

總而言之，我們對2022年2,200萬美元的合約訂單預測充滿信心。由於我們準備在未來幾年內銷售整套系統，我們相信未來24個月內仍有巨大的成長潛力。我們的團隊正在蓬勃發展，高階主管和個人貢獻者層面都有頂尖人才加入。我們正特別關注擴大銷售團隊。

We continue to lead the industry with our technical milestones and are already seeing our endeavor into barium-based systems paying off. We are the leader in the cloud quantum computing market as the only company available on all three major platforms, and compatible with every major quantum developer language.

我們持續以技術里程碑引領業界，並已見證我們在鋇基系統方面的努力取得成效。我們是雲端量子運算市場的領導者，也是唯一支援三大主流平台並相容於所有主流量子開發語言的公司。

And although we did not discuss it in detail today, our patent portfolio continues to grow at pace, which we believe will continue to be an asset for decades to come. Between our financial results, technical progress, and significant cash reserves, we believe we are well prepared to maintain our leadership position and drive the adoption of our quantum computing solutions.

雖然我們今天沒有詳細討論，但我們的專利組合仍在快速成長，我們相信這在未來幾十年仍將是一筆寶貴的資產。憑藉我們的財務表現、技術進步和雄厚的現金儲備，我們相信我們已經做好充分準備，能夠保持我們的領導地位，並推動量子運算解決方案的普及。

For more detailed information about Aria, algorithm and qubits, our barium system, SPAM error and the Microsoft announcement, I point you to our website.

有關 Aria、演算法和量子位元、我們的鋇系統、SPAM 錯誤和 Microsoft 公告的更多詳細信息，請訪問我們的網站。

And with that, I'll turn it over to Thomas for an update on our financials. Thomas?

接下來，我將把時間交給湯瑪斯，讓他報告我們的財務狀況。托馬斯？

Thank you, Peter. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us. I would like to start off by going over our results for the quarter. As Peter mentioned, we outperformed our outlook this quarter with $1.6 million in revenue and $1.5 million in contract bookings for the quarter. We ended the full year with $2.1 million in revenue, which was $500,000 or 31% higher than what we estimated on the third quarter call.

謝謝Peter。大家下午好，感謝大家的參與。首先，我想回顧一下本季的業績。正如Peter所提到的，我們本季的業績超出預期，營收160萬美元，合約訂單量150萬美元。全年收入210萬美元，比我們在第三季電話會議的預期高出50萬美元，增幅達31%。

Our TCV contract bookings ended up at $16.7 million for the year, which exceeded our most recent midpoint estimate of $15.8 million given on the Q3 call, which was already up three times from our beginning of the year forecast. Given that we are still at the beginning of our commercialization phase, and that in addition to transactional-based cloud revenue, which are large contracts or customers pay for reserved computer access, we should expect bookings to continue to be lumpy for quite some time. We have been approached by several entities about potential system sales outright, which would further add to this trend if and when these sales should happen.

我們全年的TCV合約訂單量最終達到1670萬美元，超過了我們在第三季電話會議上給出的最新中點預測1580萬美元，而這個數字已經比我們年初的預測高出了三倍。鑑於我們仍處於商業化階段的起步階段，並且除了基於交易的雲端收入（例如大額合約或客戶為預留的電腦存取付費）之外，我們預計訂單量在相當長的一段時間內仍將保持波動。已有多家實體就潛在的系統直接銷售與我們接洽，如果這些銷售真的發生，將進一步加劇這一趨勢。

Moving down to income statement, our total operating costs and expenses for the fourth quarter were $12.5 million, up 153% from the $4.9 million in the comparable prior year period. For the full year 2021, this totaled $40.8 million, up 159% from $15.7 million in 2020.

再來看損益表，我們第四季的總營運成本和費用為1,250萬美元，較去年同期的490萬美元成長153%。 2021年全年，這一數字為4,080萬美元，較2020年的1,570萬美元成長159%。

To break this down further, our research and development costs for the fourth quarter were $4.9 million, up 96% from $2.5 million in the year prior period. For the full year, R&D totaled $20.2 million, up 99% from the $10.2 million in 2020. We expect these costs to continue to increase sequentially as we invest in building our next generation of computers.

進一步細分，我們第四季的研發成本為490萬美元，較去年同期的250萬美元成長96%。全年研發支出總額為2,020萬美元，較2020年的1,020萬美元成長99%。隨著我們投資打造下一代電腦，我們預計這些成本將繼續環比成長。

Our sales and marketing costs in the fourth quarter were $849,000 up 281% from $223,000 in the year prior period. For the full year, sales and marketing costs were $3.2 million, up 565% from the $486,000 in 2020. This increase was due to further investment in our commercialization efforts and growing our sales team.

第四季度，我們的銷售和行銷成本為84.9萬美元，較去年同期的22.3萬美元成長281%。全年銷售和行銷成本為320萬美元，較2020年的48.6萬美元成長565%。這一成長源自於我們對商業化工作的進一步投入以及銷售團隊的壯大。

Our general and administrative costs in the fourth quarter were $5.4 million, up 217% from $1.7 million in the year prior period. For the full year, G&A costs were $13.7 million, up 287% from the $3.5 million in 2020. This increase is largely attributable to a growing headcount and overhead associated with scaling as well as incremental costs and fees associated with being a public company. We expect G&A costs, as a whole, to continue to increase sequentially as we hire more world-class talent to scale the business accordingly.

第四季度，我們的一般及行政管理費用為 540 萬美元，較去年同期的 170 萬美元成長 217%。全年一般及行政管理費用為 1,370 萬美元，較 2020 年的 350 萬美元成長 287%。這一成長主要歸因於員工人數的增加、規模擴張帶來的管理費用的增加，以及作為上市公司帶來的增量成本和費用。隨著我們招募更多世界級人才來相應地擴大業務規模，我們預計整體一般及行政管理費用將繼續環比增長。

In our full year results, you may also note that $4.3 million non-operating costs on our P&L, which is the portion of the transaction costs allocated to the liability classified warrants from the original dMY III IPO. This is a one-time, non-cash expense, and will not be a recurring charge.

在我們的全年業績中，您可能還會注意到，我們的損益表中有430萬美元的非營業成本，這是分配給dMY III初始IPO負債類認股權證的交易成本部分。這是一次性非現金支出，不會成為經常性費用。

We saw a net loss of $74.1 million in the fourth quarter compared to $4.9 million in the prior year period. For the full year, net loss was $106.2 million compared to a loss of $15.4 million in 2020. Included in the net losses for the fourth quarter and the year were non-cash charges related to the fair value of our warrant liabilities of $63.3 million.

第四季淨虧損7,410萬美元，去年同期淨虧損490萬美元。全年淨虧損1.062億美元，2020年全年淨虧損1,540萬美元。第四季及全年淨虧損中包含與認股權證負債公允價值相關的6,330萬美元非現金費用。

All of this resulted in an adjusted EBITDA loss for the fourth quarter of $7.9 million compared to a $4 million loss in the prior year period. For the full year, our adjusted EBITDA loss was $28.3 million compared to a $12.8 million loss in 2020.

所有這些因素導致第四季度調整後EBITDA虧損790萬美元，而去年同期虧損400萬美元。全年調整後EBITDA虧損2,830萬美元，而2020年全年虧損1,280萬美元。

Turning now to our balance sheet, cash, cash equivalents and investments as of December 31, 2021, was $603 million. Going forward, we expect our cash on hand to be sufficient to fund operations for the foreseeable future without the need to raise additional capital.

現在回顧我們的資產負債表，截至2021年12月31日，現金、現金等價物及投資為6.03億美元。展望未來，我們預計庫存現金足以支持可預見的未來運營，無需額外融資。

Recall that our transaction and dMY III closed on September 30 last year and provided us with net proceeds of $573 million. We continue to believe we are well capitalized and well positioned to benefit from increased interest in quantum computing in both the public and private sectors.

回想一下，我們的交易和 dMY III 於去年 9 月 30 日完成，為我們帶來了 5.73 億美元的淨收益。我們仍然相信，我們資本充足，並且能夠從公共和私營部門對量子計算日益增長的興趣中獲益。

I also want to mention a new development on the physical infrastructure side. We will be opening a new facility in Seattle, which we believe will be important for both talent acquisition and scaling our production engineering function.

我還想提一下實體基礎設施的新進展。我們將在西雅圖開設一家新工廠，我們相信這對人才招募和擴大我們的生產工程功能至關重要。

The Pacific Northwest has long been a hotbed of technology development and quantum computing has been no exception. As we build new and lasting ties in the area with PNNL, the northwest quantum network, and other partners in the greater Seattle area, we believe this will greatly benefit the company. We are looking forward to spending more time building relationships in quantum computers in around the Puget Sound.

太平洋西北地區長期以來一直是科技發展的溫床，量子計算也不例外。隨著我們與太平洋西北國家實驗室 (PNNL)、西北量子網路以及大西雅圖地區的其他合作夥伴在該地區建立新的、持久的聯繫，我們相信這將極大地惠及公司。我們期待在普吉特海灣週邊地區投入更多時間，在量子電腦領域建立合作關係。

Now turning to our first-quarter and full-year 2022 outlook. This year, we anticipate full-year 2022 bookings of between $20 million and $24 million, with between $3 million and $4 million for the first quarter. As a result of bookings and previous periods and new 2022 activity, we expect revenue for the full year to be between $10.2 million and $10.7 million, with between $1.8 million and $2 million for the first quarter. We also anticipate an adjusted EBITDA loss of $55 million for the full year 2022 at the midpoint of our revenue guidance.

現在談談我們對2022年第一季和全年的展望。我們預計2022年全年預訂額將在2,000萬美元至2,400萬美元之間，其中第一季預訂額將在300萬美元至400萬美元之間。考慮到預訂額、前期業績以及2022年的新業務活動，我們預計全年收入將在1020萬美元至1070萬美元之間，其中第一季收入將在180萬美元至200萬美元之間。我們也預計，根據我們收入預期的中位數，2022年全年調整後的EBITDA虧損將為5500萬美元。

Note that since we sell large contracts with term stretching several years and with implementation typically lagging in contract signing by a few months, we expect bookings to significantly exceed revenue recognition. Until our business begins to scale in a meaningful way, it is possible that the timing of large deals may have an upside impact on our revenue and bookings quarter to quarter. This means that we may not always see linear bookings growth, whereas recognize revenue will tend to follow a more traditional pattern, barring any system sales.

請注意，由於我們銷售的大型合約期限長達數年，且合約簽署後實施通常滯後數月，因此我們預計訂單量將大幅超過收入確認。在我們的業務開始顯著擴張之前，大型交易的時機可能會對我們的收入和訂單量產生季度性上行影響。這意味著，我們可能不會總是看到訂單量的線性成長，而收入確認往往會遵循更傳統的模式，除非出現系統銷售。

Investors and analysts should also be aware that even if we see a spike in bookings in the period, the impact on recognized revenue may not be significant for several quarters. Our fourth-quarter and full-year results were encouraging, and we are seeing strong momentum both in external demand and internal technical advances. The world has been through a lot in the past few years when we all learned the meaning of terms like pandemic and supply chain.

投資者和分析師也應注意，即使本季訂單量激增，其對已確認收入的影響在未來幾季內可能並不顯著。我們的第四季和全年業績令人鼓舞，外部需求和內部技術進步都呈現強勁勢頭。過去幾年，世界經歷了許多風風雨雨，我們都深刻了解疫情和供應鏈等術語的含義。

Inflation concerns and the unrest in Europe are unlikely to improve worldwide stability. 2022 brings with it its own set of challenges, but it's too early to identify the impact to the business environment. We feel comfortable saying we have no direct supply chain exposure to Russia, so we could still see there adverse effects from the general slowdown around the globe. That said, it is now clear that the current turmoil will produce headwinds that will outpace the demand from both corporations and governments as they seek solutions to previously unsolvable questions.

通膨擔憂和歐洲的動盪不太可能改善全球穩定。 2022年本身就面臨一連串挑戰，但現在判斷其對商業環境的影響還為時過早。我們可以肯定地說，我們的供應鏈與俄羅斯沒有直接關聯，因此全球經濟普遍放緩仍可能對其產生不利影響。即便如此，現在顯而易見的是，當前的動盪將帶來逆風，其速度將超過企業和政府尋求解決先前無法解決的問題的需求。

In the absence of further unforeseen events, we believe we are well positioned to continue executing our plan and look forward to updating the entire investment community on our progress.

在沒有進一步發生不可預見事件的情況下，我們相信我們有能力繼續執行我們的計劃，並期待向整個投資界通報我們的進展。

Finally, it is my pleasure to welcome the newest member of our IonQ team, Laurie Babinski. Laurie joins us as our General Counsel, with deep legal experience from Intuit's Credit Karma. Laurie brings a wealth of IP experience in the technology sector and will be a wonderful addition to the team. We look forward to working with Laurie and welcome her contributions to IonQ and the quantum computing space as a whole.

最後，我很高興歡迎 IonQ 團隊的新成員 Laurie Babinski。 Laurie 將擔任我們的總法律顧問，她在 Intuit 旗下 Credit Karma 擁有豐富的法律經驗。 Laurie 在科技領域擁有豐富的智慧財產權經驗，她將成為團隊的優秀補充。我們期待與 Laurie 合作，並歡迎她為 IonQ 乃至整個量子計算領域做出貢獻。

And with that, operator, I would like to open the line for questions.

接線員，現在我想開始回答問題。

(Operator Instructions) Ruben Roy, WestPark Capital.

（操作指示）Ruben Roy，WestPark Capital。

Thank you, and thanks very much for the questions. Hi, Peter. Congrats on the continued progress and a great finish to fiscal '21.

謝謝，非常感謝你的提問。嗨，彼得。恭喜你繼續取得進展，並在21財年取得圓滿成功。

I guess the first question I had is just around the commentary around system sales and being approached by entities around system sales. I think in the past when we've spoken about revenue rec over the next several years, system sales was a little bit further down the list in terms of how you're looking at your overall hardware. You have hardware in the cloud, you've got engineering services, et cetera.

我想我的第一個問題是關於系統銷售的評論，以及一些實體就係統銷售方面的問題。我記得過去我們討論未來幾年的收入時，系統銷售在整體硬體方面排名靠後。雲端有硬件，有工程服務等等。

Has anything changed with your view on how hardware system sales will progress? Are they potentially going to progress more quickly because of the barium qubits that you guys are working on, or anything changed in the way you're thinking about rev rec over the next three to five years? Thank you.

您對硬體系統銷售未來發展的看法有什麼改變嗎？由於你們正在研發的鋇量子比特，硬體系統銷售的成長速度是否有可能加快？或者您對未來三到五年內收入成長的看法有什麼變化？謝謝。

Well, there's a couple of pieces. One is, we do recognize to get to scale that you have to be able to manufacture multiple quantum computers, and in addition that you want those quantum computers to be standardized and easily manufacturable, which means you need to be able to support them and all the rest.

嗯，有幾點。首先，我們認識到，要實現規模化，就必須能夠製造多台量子計算機，此外，這些量子計算機還必須標準化且易於製造，這意味著你需要能夠支援它們以及其他所有方面。

So what I would say is we're ahead of schedule in terms of the technology plan. And so we're starting now to work on that particular problem. So you'll start to see -- we've already said to the market that we are going to work on photonic interconnect to start to connect these things together, and that's a way to get to much larger quantum computers.

所以我想說的是，就技術規劃而言，我們的進度已經提早了。我們現在就開始著手解決這個特定問題。所以，你們會看到——我們已經向市場宣布，我們將致力於光子互連，將這些東西連接在一起，這是實現更大規模量子電腦的一種方式。

What is new is that we have seen a great deal of interest from several customers where they have expressed interest in getting a full system. And so that is new from what we had said before.

最新的消息是，我們看到一些客戶表現出濃厚的興趣，他們表示有興趣購買一套完整的系統。這與我們之前所說的有所不同。

Great on that.

太棒了。

And the other --

另一個——

I'm sorry, go ahead.

抱歉，請繼續。

And I'll just add a little bit, just given the impact potentially on these, it obviously would drive kind of maybe a single sale would make a quarter be pretty lumpy. And so you should expect a certain amount of lumpiness going forward as we see these.

我再補充一點，考慮到這些因素可能帶來的影響，顯然單筆銷售就足以讓一個季度的業績變得相當不穩定。所以，正如我們所見，未來應該會出現一定程度的波動。

Sure. As a quick follow-up then, my question for Thomas, just around the improvement in bookings, is that fairly broad based, Thomas? Or is it more concentrated [either] by from government or some commercial partners that are coming forth? Any additional detail around the bookings' progress would be helpful. Thanks.

當然。接下來我想問湯瑪斯一個問題，關於預訂量的成長，湯瑪斯，這是否是普遍性的？還是主要受到政府或一些商業夥伴的影響？能否提供更多關於預訂量進度的細節？謝謝。

Absolutely. And you're right to ask about the rev rec. It's obviously different for system sales versus more system-as-a-service sale. However, we thought it would be prudent of us to just raise that. It's not a flag. It is more of like, it's a good thing, but we wanted to raise it before it happens so that we're not all surprised.

絕對沒錯。你問到收入記錄的問題很正確。系統銷售和系統即服務銷售顯然有所不同。不過，我們認為謹慎起見，還是提出這個問題比較好。這不是個警告。更像是一件好事，但我們希望在它發生之前就提出來，這樣我們就不會感到驚訝。

When we look at the lift in our bookings, we are seeing a continued interest from both corporate, academic, and government institutions. At current, we won't be breaking out individual sales, but we are very encouraged to see both how varied the interest is in quantum, as well as how many jobs that are submitted every day from people we don't even know who are because they're coming in through AWS and Azure and Google Cloud.

當我們看到訂單量的成長時，我們發現企業、學術機構和政府機構都對我們的服務持續感興趣。目前，我們不會公佈具體的銷售額，但我們非常高興地看到，大家對我們的服務興趣差異巨大，而且每天都有無數的作業提交，這些作業甚至來自我們甚至不認識的人，因為他們是透過 AWS、Azure 和 Google Cloud 提交的。

Sure, okay. Thank you very much, guys. Congrats again.

好的，好的。非常感謝大家。再次恭喜。

Thank you, Ruben.

謝謝你，魯本。

Scott Kessler, Morgan Stanley.

摩根士丹利的史考特凱斯勒。

Hi, guys. Congratulations on a great quarter. Following up on the system sales question, what impact should we expect that that has on the operating model, particularly around margins?

大家好。恭喜您本季取得了出色的成績。接下來是系統銷售的問題，我們預期這會對營運模式，尤其是利潤率產生什麼影響？

We are not foreseeing any immediate change to the operating model. But what you will see is that once we implement the system sale, you would see a bump both in bookings revenue and margins because you're able to take down all of the benefit of the revenue to the current whereas, we will not stretch out all the expenses. So it will be a bump to the margin, but it wouldn't be an immediate, like it wouldn't be outside of the model because we still would recognize all the same costs. It just happened one period instead of several.

我們預計營運模式不會立即改變。但您會看到，一旦我們實施系統銷售，預訂收入和利潤率都會大幅提升，因為您可以將所有收入收益計入當期，而我們不會將所有費用攤提。因此，利潤率會有所提升，但不會立即生效，就像在模型之外一樣，因為我們仍然會確認所有相同的成本。這只是發生在一個時期，而不是幾個時期。

Got it. Got it. And then if I could get a follow-up in as well. Could you just share some early customer feedback you had from the Aria launch?

明白了。明白了。然後，請問您能否跟進。您能否分享一些 Aria 發布後的早期客戶回饋？

Generally, the customer feedback is really very, very positive. People are impressed with what this new hardware can do and are excited to see kind of being able to take their applications to the next level. So far, the customer feedback has been tremendous.

整體而言，客戶的回饋非常正面。人們對這款新硬體的功能印象深刻，並期待它能將他們的應用程式提升到一個新的水平。到目前為止，客戶回饋非常積極。

Excellent. Thanks, guys.

太棒了！謝謝大家。

David Williams, Benchmark Company.

大衛威廉斯 (David Williams)，Benchmark 公司。

Hey, good afternoon. Thanks for the time and let me ask a question. You're making some very nice headway here, some good progress. But I wanted to ask is you have to think about the landscape and understand the technology and applications. How do you envision the competitive dynamics developing over time?

嘿，下午好。感謝您抽出時間，讓我問一個問題。您在這方面取得了一些非常好的進展，一些很好的進展。但我想問的是，您必須思考整個格局，了解技術和應用。您如何看待競爭態勢的長期發展？

It seems the size of the opportunity with a lot of room for, I guess, multiple technologies to coexist without restrictions to growth. And just kind of curious how you think about the competitive landscape and maybe your business just kind of given the strength of your systems.

我認為這個機會很大，而且有很大空間讓多種技術共存，不受成長限制。我很好奇，考慮到你們的系統優勢，你們如何看待競爭格局，以及你們的業務。

You might hear from some competitors where they think that there'll be kind of certain niches that they'll be able to kind of be the leader in. It's interesting in, depending on the qubit technology, when you have to design the chip at before manufacture time, that's where you sit down and make a business decision. Because of this early stage of their processors, that may be a particular chip might be designed in a way that might help a particular application.

你可能會聽到一些競爭對手說，他們認為自己在某些細分市場中能夠成為領導者。有趣的是，根據量子位元技術的不同，晶片設計在生產之前進行，而這正是你坐下來做出商業決策的時候。由於他們的處理器還處於早期階段，特定晶片的設計可能會針對特定應用。

And obviously one manufacturer can't go and do all chips for all applications. That leads to that segmentation. Interestingly enough at IonQ, we do the design of the chip, if you will, at runtime. And so we can do at runtime any -- we can basically design, if you will, the chip. The perfect chip for your application.

顯然，一家製造商不可能為所有應用生產所有晶片。這就導致了晶片的細分化。有趣的是，在 IonQ，我們可以在晶片運行時進行設計。所以我們可以在運行時完成任何工作——我們基本上可以設計出適合您應用的完美晶片。

So we kind of see our devices unique in that sense, and that it can be morphed on the fly for any application, which makes it more a better machine than, say, some of the competitors. At some point, we'll have so many qubits that you can throw away qubits and do a least common denominator approach to quantum, but that's not in the near term.

所以，從這個意義上來說，我們的設備可以說是獨一無二的，它可以隨時根據任何應用程式進行調整，這使得它比某些競爭對手的機器更優秀。將來，我們的量子比特會變得非常多，以至於你可以捨棄一些量子比特，採用最小公分母方法來處理量子問題，但這在短期內還無法實現。

But IonQ basically doesn't have to make that decision. We basically wire up the chip at runtime. And so, you can basically be anyone else has a chip and all of them combined at the same time.

但 IonQ 基本上不需要做這個決定。我們基本上在運行時連接晶片。所以，基本上任何人都可以擁有一個晶片，並同時將它們組合在一起。

Thanks so much for the color. And I guess one of the other areas I know that investors and even I think about your customers, difficulty understanding maybe some of the benchmarking and how you stack up with other ones. And I know that the algorithm and qubit is an important metric there. Could you kind of walk us through the value there and why the algorithm at qubit is more important to think about versus maybe center cubit and how you stack up in so many others?

非常感謝你提供的顏色。我想，我知道投資者，甚至我也會想到你們的客戶，可能難以理解一些基準測試，以及你們與其他公司相比如何。我知道演算法和量子比特是其中重要的指標。你能不能跟我們講講這方面的價值，以及為什麼量子比特的演算法比中心肘位更重要，以及你們在許多其他方面的表現如何？

Yeah. So the first thing is the benchmarks themselves. These were selected by the QED-C, which is industry consortium made up of all the quantum companies. So first thing to know is it wasn't, if you will, an IonQ choice of algorithms. Although we obviously had an input to the selection with many other companies.

是的。首先要說的是基準測試本身。這些基準測試是由 QED-C 選定的，QED-C 是由所有量子公司組成的產業聯盟。所以首先要知道的是，這並非 IonQ 自己選擇的演算法。儘管我們顯然與許多其他公司一起參與了演算法的選擇。

We think it's important because these benchmarks represent the same kinds of programs that we think customers are going to want to run. And so in that sense, the benchmark is closer to being representative to what a customer will run. Other things are much more esoteric, and I might be looking at kind of one particular component and not all of them combined into one thing.

我們認為這很重要，因為這些基準測試代表了我們認為客戶想要執行的程式類型。因此，從這個意義上講，基準測試更接近代表客戶實際運行的內容。其他方面則更加深奧，我可能只專注於某個特定的組件，而不是所有組件的組合。

So this is very similar, if you will, to the classical world. There's a number of classical benchmarks which everyone uses in HPC, or even laptops, which are all application-oriented benchmarks. And we think it's important that an independent organization like QED-C or maybe IEEE should be the one who is deciding what the benchmarks are.

所以，如果你願意這麼說，這與經典世界非常相似。在高效能運算（HPC）甚至筆記型電腦中，每個人都在使用一些經典的基準測試，它們都是面向應用的基準測試。我們認為，由像 QED-C 或 IEEE 這樣的獨立組織來決定這些基準測試非常重要。

And an improvement from what's happening today would be to have an independent third party to actually run them, and so instead of the individual companies running them. We'd be in favor of all of that because we think we would easily -- we'll easily continue to lead.

與目前情況相比，一個改進方案是，由獨立的第三方來實際運營，而不是由單一公司來運營。我們支持所有這些方案，因為我們認為我們可以輕鬆地——我們可以輕鬆地繼續保持領先地位。

Very helpful. Thanks so much.

非常有幫助。非常感謝。

Richard Shannon, Craig-Hallum.

理查德·香農，克雷格·哈勒姆。

Well, hi, guys. Thanks for taking my questions. Maybe one for Thomas, here more of a tactical question on your guidance here, both on revenues and bookings. I guess probably more so pointed to revenues, but maybe you want to comment on the bookings part as well. The ranges here you have for this year are fairly tight, which would imply a sense of precision here. And so wanted to get your sense of why so precise. Is this -- you have a lot of visibility into these numbers, and how would you characterize the upside potential as you go through the year?

大家好。感謝您回答我的問題。我想問Thomas一個戰術性的問題，關於您對收入和預訂的期望。我想您更傾向於收入，但也許您也想談談預訂量。您今年的預期範圍相當窄，這意味著一種精準的感覺。所以想了解一下您為什麼這麼精準。您對這些數據有很高的預見性嗎？您如何看待全年的上升潛力？

Excellent question and thank you for raising it. Obviously, it is hard to make predictions, particularly about the future. But when it comes to revenue, it is actually not that hard because the way bookings tend to turn into recognize revenue, it is straight line on the types of contracts we have sold up until now. And there is an implementation lag between when we sell it and when they start producing revenue of roughly three months.

這個問題問得好，謝謝你提出。顯然，預測很難，尤其是對未來的預測。但說到收入，其實並不難，因為訂單轉化為確認收入的方式與我們迄今售出的合約類型呈直線關係。而且，從我們售出合約到他們開始產生收入，存在大約三個月的實施滯後。

So you can do that also knowing that most sales in a quarter, unfortunately, it tend to happen at the end of the quarter, and so you can build your rev rec are scheduled that way. But when it comes to bookings, we have taken the approach that, we know what's in our funnel, we know how we score that funnel. Should we outperform? Yes.

所以，你也能做到這一點，因為不幸的是，一個季度的大部分銷售往往發生在季度末，所以你可以按照這個計劃來安排你的收入記錄。但說到預訂，我們採取的方法是我們了解漏斗裡有什麼，我們知道如何對漏斗進行評分。我們應該超越嗎？是的。

However, I would, we could -- obviously, every company can also underperform. We think, and it will be hard to see us come in at less than $20 million. So we're looking this as a minimum $20 million bet. And what we could have bluebirds, which is why we brought it up. However, we don't think that they would happen as quickly, but they could. And that's why we're actually raising that, so that we will not be surprised. We would all like to have that surprise when it happens, though.

然而，我想，我們也可能——顯然，每家公司都可能表現不佳。我們認為，我們的投資金額很難低於2,000萬美元。所以我們把這筆投資視為至少2000萬美元的賭注。我們可能會投資藍鳥，這就是我們提出這個問題的原因。然而，我們認為藍鳥不會這麼快就實現，但確實有可能。這就是為什麼我們實際上提高了這個數字，這樣我們就不會感到驚訝。不過，我們都希望當它實現時能有驚喜。

Okay. That's very helpful, Thomas. Thanks for that. Maybe a multi-party here on the sales opportunity here in the structure and workforce you're supporting. I think you talked about doubling the sales force this year. I guess the first question to that is how similar is this to the assumptions built into your models in the [spec] process. Is this above or below that in terms of pace?

好的。這很有幫助，托馬斯。謝謝你。也許你們支持的架構和員工隊伍中存在銷售機會，需要多方參與。我記得你提到今年要把銷售隊伍擴大一倍。我想第一個問題是，這與你們在[規格]流程中模型中設定的假設有多相似？就速度而言，是高於還是低於這個數字？

And then I think you said specifically the sales force to be built in part to kind of ramp up Europe. Maybe if you want to characterize the opportunity you see outside of the US, Europe versus Asia and others, just to give us a sense of where you're focusing and why.

然後，我想您特別提到了要組建銷售團隊，部分原因是為了擴大歐洲市場。您可以描述您在美國以外地區看到的機遇，例如歐洲與亞洲及其他地區的對比，以便讓我們了解您的重點領域以及原因。

Just in terms of head count, it's about what we said in the original pipe model, or what we thought. And the point, though, to be honest, is that last year we started with almost zero in terms of sales team. So on the sales side, we're really just getting going. And that's really the point. And we're making good progress on that in terms of the number of people this year.

就員工人數而言，這與我們在最初的管道模型中所說的或我們的想法一致。不過，說實話，關鍵在於，去年我們的銷售團隊幾乎是零。所以在銷售方面，我們才剛起步。這才是關鍵所在。就今年的員工數量而言，我們在這方面取得了良好的進展。

In terms of locations, we see customers overseas which would be in Europe and Asia, which would be Japan and South Korea and Australia. There seems to be a great deal of interest there as well.

就地點而言，我們看到海外客戶在歐洲和亞洲，例如日本、韓國和澳洲。這些地區似乎也有很多興趣。

Okay. Great for that. And one last question for me, I'll jump out of line. Peter, wanted to get your sense of the overall environment here. You've seen the -- as the first one to come into the public market, seeing a couple of spin outs, couple of companies one -- not quite in one all the way through the spec process here. So a lot more interest and activity in funding in this space.

好的。太好了。最後一個問題，我先跳出來。彼得，我想了解你對這裡整體環境的看法。作為第一家進入公開市場的公司，你看到了一些分拆出來的公司，有些公司還沒有完全完成整個上市流程。所以，這個領域的融資興趣和活動都變多了。

You've got a fairly substantial cash position here that you seem to be able to fund all of your operations organically here. How do you see the market and the need for M&A either in terms of technical teams or even the organizations either hardware or software that might be of interest and plug into what IonQ has already done today?

你們的現金狀況相當可觀，似乎能夠有機地支持所有營運。您如何看待市場以及併購的需求？無論是技術團隊，還是可能對 IonQ 現有業務感興趣的硬體或軟體組織？

Certainly, we are keeping an eye out for those particular opportunities going forward. That's an active task at the current time. I do think, just in general, that while on one hand, there's more money going into many quantum companies, at the same time, I expect a great deal of consolidation to happen over the next several years.

當然，我們正在密切關注這些未來的機會。這是目前一項積極的工作。我確實認為，總的來說，一方面，越來越多的資金湧入許多量子公司，同時，我預計未來幾年將出現大量整合。

I think you'll see some players who will decide that their technical approach to their hardware is too far behind and will throw in the towel. And I expect, too, that we'll see new players who have interest in quantum that haven't expressed it today, because I think a lot of tech companies are just starting to realize that they need to be a player in quantum.

我認為你會看到一些參與者認為他們在硬體方面的技術方法太落後了，最終選擇放棄。我也預計，我們會看到一些對量子技術感興趣的新參與者，儘管他們目前還沒有表達過這種興趣，因為我認為很多科技公司才剛開始意識到他們需要成為量子領域的參與者。

So there's a number of notable players yet that no one knows what their quantum strategy is. And so there are new opportunities for partnership and such going forward. So that's kind of -- it's certainly an interesting time in quantum.

所以，目前有很多知名的參與者，但沒人知道他們的量子策略是什麼。因此，未來合作等方面也存在新的機會。這無疑是量子領域一個有趣的時代。

No doubt about that. No doubt about that, Peter. Thanks. I think that's all the questions for me, and I appreciate it, guys. Thanks.

毫無疑問。毫無疑問，彼得。謝謝。我想這就是我要問的所有問題了，非常感謝大家。謝謝。

(Operator Instructions) Quinn Bolton, Needham.

（操作員指示）奎因·博爾頓，尼德姆。

Good afternoon. Thanks for letting me ask a question. I wanted to start just on the outright sale of the quantum computers. Maybe if you could, could you talk to us about your thought process via how do you go about pricing these systems? Is it based on gate fidelities? Is it based on number of algorithm and qubits? And then follow-up question is what's your manufacturing capacity of number of systems per year to the extent you started to get these orders for full-blown quantum systems?

午安.感謝您抽空提問。我想先從量子電腦的直接銷售開始。如果可以的話，您能否談談您是如何為這些系統定價的？是基於閘保真度嗎？還是基於演算法和量子位元的數量？接下來的問題是，在開始獲得成熟量子系統訂單之前，您每年的產能是多少？

It's certainly a great question. So maybe just to point out, the first thing, which is obvious that you can't use the same sort of model for classical as you can for quantum in terms of price performance. Because, as you saw, just here these new machines are 1,000 times more powerful than last year's model. So they can't be 1,000 times more expensive.

這確實是一個很好的問題。所以，首先我想指出的是，就性價比而言，經典計算和量子計算顯然不能使用同一種模型。因為如你所見，這些新機器的性能比去年的型號強1000倍。所以它們的價格不可能貴1000倍。

And in the future, it's just going to get worse and worse. You'll get to sometime in the future where the next model will be 100 times -- 100,000 times more powerful than the previous model. So you clearly need a more aggressive price performance mix up than what you get today. Today, we expect in the classical world kind of every year or 18 months using Moore's Law to double the performance and be able to buy the same laptop, if you will, for the same price in that same period. Or in other ways, it's half the cost.

未來情況只會越來越糟。未來某個時候，下一代機型的效能會比上一代強100倍，甚至10萬倍。所以，顯然需要比現在更激進的性價比組合。今天，我們按照摩爾定律，按照經典理論，大約每年或每18個月就能將性能翻一番，而在同一時期，人們可以以同樣的價格買到同樣的筆記型電腦。或者換句話說，價格減半。

And that leads to an observation, which is price per qubit needs to be going down in every generation. And so as much as we are focused on the technology to improve the quantum computers themselves, we're also likewise focused on the manufacturing cost going forward and shrinking the costs in every generation, which generally means probably for everyone, but us included -- including us, which is they have to get smaller. Because every time, if every generation gets smaller, generally, the things get cheaper.

由此得出一個結論：每個量子位元的價格每一代都需要下降。因此，我們不僅專注於改進量子電腦本身的技術，也同樣關注未來的製造成本，並努力降低每一代的成本。這通常意味著，對所有人，包括我們自己，它們必須變得更小。因為如果每一代都變得更小，通常情況下，它們就會變得更便宜。

So we're just standing up a manufacturing group this year, whose sole purpose it is to work on that particular problem set. We will not deliver. I don't believe first, computers off that line until early 2023.

所以我們今年只是成立了一個製造小組，其唯一目的就是解決這一系列問題。我們不會交付。首先，我認為要到2023年初，這條生產線上的電腦才能下線。

Got it. Understood. Yes, thank you. Thank you, Peter. A second question I just had you went through a number of the benefits of the barium-based ion trap technology. Wondering if there's anything that you think still on the critical path that you haven't been able to overcome on those systems. Or do you think at this point you've sort of overcome all of the challenges, and it's really just sort of blocking and tackling to get the barium-based systems into production?

明白了。明白了。是的，謝謝。謝謝你，彼得。我剛剛問的第二個問題是，您介紹了鋇基離子阱技術的諸多優勢。您認為在這些系統上，還有什麼關鍵問題尚未解決嗎？或者，您認為目前為止，您已經克服了所有挑戰，現在只是在進行一些阻斷和攻關，以便將鋇基系統投入生產？

As we've kind of said them all along, everything that we're doing, we have shown working in a lab once before. So we do not need a breakthrough in manufacturing, in material science, physics, no breakthroughs are required. We're largely an engineering organization where we're taking what the two co-founders have done at the university laboratories and productizing it.

正如我們一直強調的那樣，我們所做的一切，都曾在實驗室中展現過。因此，我們不需要製造、材料科學和物理學的突破，我們不需要任何突破。我們基本上是一個工程組織，我們只是將兩位共同創辦人在大學實驗室的成果轉化為產品。

So the short answer is no, I don't think there's anything -- there is nothing that's standing in our way. There is no magic that we have to figure out going forward to getting to a much larger quantum computer.

所以簡而言之，答案是「不」。我認為沒有什麼——沒有什麼能阻擋我們前進的道路。我們不需要想出什麼魔法就能製造出更強大的量子電腦。

Thank you. And then just quickly for Thomas. You've given adjusted EBITDA forecast of $55 million loss in 2022. Can you give us any sense on what the CapEx may be or what a good estimate for cash burn over the year would be?

謝謝。然後快速地問托馬斯。您預測2022年調整後的EBITDA虧損為5,500萬美元。您能否告訴我們資本支出可能是多少，或全年現金消耗的合理估計是多少？

Yes, just one second while we pull that up. So obviously, since we are manufacturing hardware, there is CapEx involved that will sometimes outpace our OpEx. However, we do think that that's going to level out at, let's say, three to four years now, I would expect that our CapEx this year should be around $23 million more or less.

是的，等一下，我們來看看。顯然，由於我們製造硬件，涉及的資本支出有時會超過我們的營運支出。不過，我們確實認為，比如說，三到四年後，這個數字會趨於平穩。我預計今年的資本支出應該在2300萬美元左右。

Perfect. Perfect. Thank you very much.

完美！完美！非常感謝。

Thank you.

謝謝。

Ladies and gentlemen, we have reached the end of the question-and-answer session. I will now turn the call over to management for closing remarks.

女士們，先生們，問答環節到此結束。現在，我將把發言權交給管理階層，請他們發表結束語。

Well, thanks, everyone, for joining today. I'll just actually make a comment to that. I'd like to thank all the staff members at IonQ who've worked long hours to make these results possible. So thank you so much.

好的，感謝大家今天的參與。我只想就此發表一點看法。我要感謝 IonQ 的所有員工，他們為這些成果付出了巨大的努力。非常感謝你們。

And we are extremely excited by the results from last year and the continued growth we expect this year. So we expect -- last year was an exciting year, and we expect this year to continue that pace. So thanks again for joining.

我們對去年的業績以及今年預期的持續成長感到非常興奮。所以我們預計——去年是令人興奮的一年，我們預計今年將延續這一成長勢頭。再次感謝您的參與。

This concludes today's conference. And you may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation and have a wonderful day.

今天的會議到此結束。各位現在可以掛斷電話了。感謝您的參與，祝您有美好的一天。