IONQ Inc (IONQ) 2023 Q1 法說會逐字稿

Greetings. And welcome to the IonQ first-quarter 2023 earnings call. (Operator Instructions) As a reminder, this conference is being recorded.

問候。歡迎來到 IonQ 2023 年第一季度財報電話會議。 （操作員說明）提醒一下，正在錄製此會議。

I would now like to turn the conference over to your host Jordan Shapiro, Vice President FP&A and Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

我現在想把會議轉交給你的主持人 Jordan Shapiro，他是 FP&A 副總裁兼投資者關係主管。請繼續。

Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to IonQ's first-quarter 2023 earnings call. My name is Jordan Shapiro, and I am the Vice President of Financial Planning & Analysis and Head of Investor Relations here at IonQ.

大家下午好，歡迎來到 IonQ 的 2023 年第一季度財報電話會議。我叫 Jordan Shapiro，是 IonQ 的財務規劃與分析副總裁兼投資者關係主管。

I am pleased to be joined on today's call by Peter Chapman, IonQ's President and Chief Executive Officer; Thomas Kramer, our Chief Financial Officer; Dr. Chris Monroe, our Co-Founder and Chief Scientist; and Dr. Jungsang Kim, our Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer.

我很高興參加今天 IonQ 總裁兼首席執行官 Peter Chapman 的電話會議；我們的首席財務官 Thomas Kramer；我們的聯合創始人兼首席科學家 Chris Monroe 博士；和我們的聯合創始人兼首席技術官 Jungsang Kim 博士。

By now, everyone should have access to the company's first-quarter 2023 earnings press release issued this afternoon, which is available on the Investor Relations section of our website at investors.ionq.com.

到目前為止，每個人都應該可以訪問公司今天下午發布的 2023 年第一季度收益新聞稿，該新聞稿可在我們網站 investors.ionq.com 的投資者關係部分獲取。

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 reconciliation of adjusted EBITDA to its closest comparable GAAP measure.

請注意，在今天的電話會議上，管理層將參考調整後的 EBITDA，這是一項非 GAAP 財務指標。雖然公司認為這種非 GAAP 財務措施為投資者提供了有用的信息，但不應孤立地考慮或替代根據 GAAP 提供的財務信息。您將被定向到我們的新聞稿，以了解調整後的 EBITDA 與其最接近的可比 GAAP 衡量標準的對賬情況。

During the call, we will discuss our business outlook and make forward-looking statements. These comments are based on our predictions and expectations as of today. Actual events or results could differ materially due to a number of risks and uncertainties, including those mentioned in our most recent filings with the SEC.

在電話會議中，我們將討論我們的業務前景並做出前瞻性陳述。這些評論基於我們截至今天的預測和期望。由於許多風險和不確定性，包括我們最近向美國證券交易委員會提交的文件中提到的風險和不確定性，實際事件或結果可能存在重大差異。

Now I will turn it over to Peter Chapman, President and CEO of IonQ. Peter?

現在我將把它交給 IonQ 總裁兼首席執行官 Peter Chapman。彼得？

Thanks, Jordan. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us for our first-quarter 2023 earnings call.

謝謝，喬丹。大家下午好，感謝您加入我們的 2023 年第一季度財報電話會議。

We finished the first quarter with $4.3 million in revenue, which was above the high end of our expected range. Meanwhile, we booked $4.1 million in new contracts and are maintaining this year's annual booking guidance. Thomas will share more details on our commercial activity and financials later in the call.

我們以 430 萬美元的收入結束了第一季度，高於我們預期範圍的高端。與此同時，我們預訂了 410 萬美元的新合同，並維持今年的年度預訂指導。 Thomas 將在稍後的電話會議中分享有關我們商業活動和財務的更多詳細信息。

We continue to move forward at full speed at IonQ, trailblazing in our industry. In our view, we have distanced ourselves from the pack of pure play quantum computing companies by having the best cash position by a wide margin. We also believe we are sufficiently funded to get the company to profitability based on our current roadmap. IonQ will continue to focus on achieving quantum advantage and developing commercial applications for our customers.

我們在 IonQ 繼續全速前進，在我們的行業中處於領先地位。在我們看來，我們擁有最大的現金頭寸，從而與純粹的量子計算公司拉開了距離。我們還相信，根據我們目前的路線圖，我們有足夠的資金讓公司盈利。 IonQ 將繼續專注於實現量子優勢並為我們的客戶開發商業應用。

At IonQ, our primary focus has been not on the quantity of qubits in the system but on the quality of the qubits and their operations. For quantum computers, this quality, also known as fidelity, is the key differentiator in successfully completing computational tasks. We measure the fidelity of our systems using an application-oriented benchmark we call algorithmic qubits or AQ. AQ is based on work pioneered by the Quantum Economic Development Consortium, an independent industry group, and evaluates quantum computers' utility in real world settings. Last year, we achieved our goal of hitting 25 AQ.

在 IonQ，我們的主要關注點不是系統中量子位的數量，而是量子位的質量及其操作。對於量子計算機，這種質量，也稱為保真度，是成功完成計算任務的關鍵區別因素。我們使用我們稱為算法量子位或 AQ 的面向應用的基準來衡量我們系統的保真度。 AQ 基於獨立行業組織量子經濟發展聯盟 (Quantum Economic Development Consortium) 開創的工作，評估量子計算機在現實世界環境中的實用性。去年，我們實現了達到 25 AQ 的目標。

This year, we set an even more ambitious goal of hitting 29 AQ by the end of the year. Recall that every additional AQ corresponds to roughly doubling useful computational space, meaning we can run much more powerful quantum algorithms. Today, I am excited to share that we have hit our 29 AQ target, meeting our 2023 technical goal seven months early. This achievement made possible by the hard work and dedication of the full IonQ team brings dramatically more powerful quantum computing capability to our customers and puts us one step closer to reaching quantum advantage.

今年，我們設定了一個更加雄心勃勃的目標，即到年底達到 29 AQ。回想一下，每個額外的 AQ 對應於大約兩倍的可用計算空間，這意味著我們可以運行更強大的量子算法。今天，我很高興地宣布我們已經達到了 29 AQ 目標，提前七個月實現了 2023 年的技術目標。整個 IonQ 團隊的辛勤工作和奉獻使這一成就成為可能，為我們的客戶帶來了更強大的量子計算能力，使我們更接近實現量子優勢。

Once more, I am excited to announce that we hit this target using IonQ Forte, our newest world class quantum system. You may remember that we first announced work on our Forte system midway through last year, with the goal of running customer jobs on Forte before the end of 2022. We achieved that goal.

再次，我很高興地宣布，我們使用我們最新的世界級量子系統 IonQ Forte 實現了這一目標。您可能還記得，我們在去年年中首次宣布了 Forte 系統的工作，目標是在 2022 年底之前在 Forte 上運行客戶作業。我們實現了這個目標。

Our next major technical milestone is achieving 35 AQ, which is particularly significant. At 35 AQ, simulating the operations of quantum algorithms using classical hardware can become exceedingly challenging and costly. We expect at 35 AQ, some customers will have an increasingly clear business case for running models on actual quantum computers rather than attempting to simulate those models with classical computers.

我們的下一個主要技術里程碑是達到 35 AQ，這尤其重要。在 35 AQ 時，使用經典硬件模擬量子算法的操作可能變得極具挑戰性且成本高昂。我們預計在 35 AQ 時，一些客戶將有越來越清晰的業務案例，可以在實際量子計算機上運行模型，而不是嘗試用經典計算機模擬這些模型。

If you're watching the quantum industry for science of our computers becoming more practical or more powerful than classical computers, hitting 35 AQ is an important milestone to track. The next steps will be for our systems to take on problems that are beyond the capacity of even the best quantum simulators and subsequently to tackle problems that even the best supercomputers can't solve. We anticipate each of these milestones driving further commercial adoption.

如果您正在觀察我們的計算機科學的量子產業變得比傳統計算機更實用或更強大，那麼達到 35 AQ 是一個需要追踪的重要里程碑。下一步將是讓我們的系統解決即使是最好的量子模擬器也無法解決的問題，並隨後解決即使是最好的超級計算機也無法解決的問題。我們預計這些里程碑中的每一個都會推動進一步的商業採用。

Since going public about 20 months ago, we've been dramatically increasing our AQ, going from 6 AQ commercially available on our IonQ Harmony systems to now 29 AQ on IonQ Forte. That represents an increase of more than 1 AQ per month on average. Similarly, if you look ahead to our goal of hitting 64 AQ by the end of 2025, that also represents an average increase of more than 1 AQ per month.

自從大約 20 個月前上市以來，我們一直在大幅提高我們的 AQ，從 IonQ Harmony 系統上的 6 AQ 增加到現在 IonQ Forte 上的 29 AQ。這表示平均每月增加超過 1 個 AQ。同樣，如果您展望我們到 2025 年底達到 64 AQ 的目標，這也意味著每月平均增加超過 1 個 AQ。

Moore's Law famously predicted the number of transistors in an integrated circuit would double roughly every two years. As a reminder, each additional AQ roughly doubles the power of our systems, as measured by the useful computational space for running quantum algorithms. Moore's Law was about doubling every two years. At IonQ, we've been doubling our system's power every month on average. For example, the most recently from 25 AQ to 29 AQ represents a 16-fold increase in computational power.

著名的摩爾定律預測集成電路中的晶體管數量大約每兩年翻一番。提醒一下，根據運行量子算法的有用計算空間來衡量，每增加一個 AQ 大約會使我們系統的能力增加一倍。摩爾定律是每兩年翻一番。在 IonQ，我們平均每個月都將系統的性能提高一倍。例如，最近從 25 AQ 到 29 AQ 代表計算能力提高了 16 倍。

Potential customers are noticing the superior performance of IonQ systems. And with demand for IonQ compute time rapidly rising, we have been accelerating our system manufacturing efforts. Today, I am proud to announce that we have completed construction of our second Aria-class quantum computer, also known as Aria 2. This new machine will join Aria 1 on the public cloud this quarter.

潛在客戶注意到 IonQ 系統的卓越性能。隨著對 IonQ 計算時間的需求迅速增加，我們一直在加快系統製造工作。今天，我很自豪地宣布，我們已經完成了第二台 Aria 級量子計算機的構建，也稱為 Aria 2。這台新機器將在本季度加入公有云上的 Aria 1。

Bringing Aria 2 online is a crucial step for our commercial efforts, as it improves our redundancy capacity and order processing speed. Speaking of customers, we are proud to announce that as part of our commercialization efforts, earlier this year, we signed a contract with the United Emirates Quantum Research Center, Technology Innovation Institute, to explore how quantum computing can give the UAE a competitive edge. This agreement is a testament to the trust and confidence that global leaders have in IonQ's cutting edge technology and our ability to drive breakthroughs in quantum computing.

將 Aria 2 上線是我們商業努力的關鍵一步，因為它提高了我們的冗餘能力和訂單處理速度。說到客戶，我們很自豪地宣布，作為我們商業化努力的一部分，今年早些時候，我們與阿聯酋技術創新研究所量子研究中心簽署了一份合同，以探索量子計算如何為阿聯酋帶來競爭優勢。該協議證明了全球領導者對 IonQ 尖端技術的信任和信心，以及我們推動量子計算突破的能力。

In addition to bringing on more customers, we're also seeing strong results from existing customers taking advantage of our increasingly powerful systems. In collaboration with Fidelity Center for Applied Technology, or FCAT, we are proud to announce new work in the field of quantum Monte Carlo. Our newest accomplishment focuses on speeding up Monte Carlo simulations, a widely used statistical analysis method in finance, science, and engineering.

除了吸引更多客戶外，我們還看到現有客戶利用我們日益強大的系統帶來的強勁成果。我們與 Fidelity Center for Applied Technology (FCAT) 合作，自豪地宣佈在量子蒙特卡羅領域的新工作。我們的最新成就側重於加速蒙特卡洛模擬，這是一種在金融、科學和工程領域廣泛使用的統計分析方法。

A year ago, we started investing in quantum artificial intelligence or quantum AI. Our first output of that work is a paper on modeling human cognition, which has now been published in the peer-reviewed scientific journal, Entropy. We are excited by the potential for quantum to power not just machine learning but also artificial general intelligence or AGI, the point at which AI is strong enough to accomplish any task that a human can.

一年前，我們開始投資量子人工智能或量子人工智能。我們這項工作的第一個成果是一篇關於模擬人類認知的論文，該論文現已發表在同行評審的科學期刊 Entropy 上。我們對量子不僅可以為機器學習提供動力，還可以為通用人工智能或 AGI 提供動力的潛力感到興奮，在這一點上，人工智能足以完成人類可以完成的任何任務。

With application areas for quantum becoming increasingly clear, we're also forging channel partnerships that will help us distribute IonQ compute access to a broad set of customers around the globe. We added a new enterprise partnership in April when IonQ joined forces with BearingPoint, a global management and technology consulting firm, to power their growing quantum team in Europe. BearingPoint has offices in 24 countries around the world and has over 5,000 employees with their quantum team soon to be trained on our systems.

隨著量子應用領域變得越來越清晰，我們還在建立渠道合作夥伴關係，這將幫助我們將 IonQ 計算訪問分配給全球範圍內的廣大客戶。我們在 4 月增加了新的企業合作夥伴關係，當時 IonQ 與全球管理和技術諮詢公司 BearingPoint 聯手，為他們在歐洲不斷壯大的量子團隊提供支持。 BearingPoint 在全球 24 個國家/地區設有辦事處，其量子團隊的 5,000 多名員工很快將接受我們系統的培訓。

BearingPoint premier clients will be offered access to IonQ's world-class quantum computing systems and application development services. Our momentum here at IonQ continues to build. We hit our key technical target for the full year well ahead of schedule, beat our revenue goal for the quarter, innovated with our customers to solve new problems, and tapped into a new channel partnership in Europe.

BearingPoint 的主要客戶將能夠訪問 IonQ 的世界級量子計算系統和應用程序開發服務。我們在 IonQ 的勢頭繼續增強。我們提前實現了全年的關鍵技術目標，超過了本季度的收入目標，與客戶一起創新以解決新問題，並在歐洲建立了新的渠道合作夥伴關係。

Lastly, it is my pleasure to introduce Pat Tang, the newest member of the IonQ leadership team. Pat will be taking over as Vice President of Research and Development. He brings to IonQ over 23 years of technology experience, most recently as a VP of Engineering at Amazon's Lab126. Pat is one more testament to the best-in-class talent that is convening at IonQ.

最後，我很高興介紹 IonQ 領導團隊的最新成員 Pat Tang。 Pat 將接任研發副總裁一職。他為 IonQ 帶來了超過 23 年的技術經驗，最近擔任亞馬遜 Lab126 的工程副總裁。 Pat 是 IonQ 召集的一流人才的又一證明。

And with that, I would like to turn the call over to Thomas for a more detailed review of the financials. Thomas?

有了這個，我想把電話轉給托馬斯，以便對財務狀況進行更詳細的審查。托馬斯？

Thank you, Peter. Now, let's walk through this quarter's financial results in more detail.

謝謝你，彼得。現在，讓我們更詳細地了解本季度的財務業績。

As Peter mentioned, we had an excellent quarter, recognizing $4.3 million in revenue, which was above the high end of the outlook we previously provided. This reflects to us being able to complete work ahead of schedule for some of our milestone-dependent revenue. While we experienced some accelerated revenue recognition from Q2 into Q1, we anticipate that the full-year impact will be lower given how projects and milestones are distributed between periods.

正如彼得所提到的，我們有一個出色的季度，確認了 430 萬美元的收入，這高於我們之前提供的前景的高端。這反映出我們能夠提前完成一些與里程碑相關的收入的工作。雖然我們從第二季度到第一季度經歷了一些加速的收入確認，但我們預計，考慮到項目和里程碑在不同時期之間的分配方式，全年的影響將會降低。

We exited the quarter with $4.1 million in bookings, which is a great start towards our stated expectations of between $38 million to $42 million for the full year. Given that we are still at the beginning of our commercialization phase, I want to reiterate my comments from prior earnings calls that we expect bookings to continue to be lumpy for quite some time.

我們以 410 萬美元的預訂量結束了本季度，這是朝著我們聲明的全年 3800 萬至 4200 萬美元的預期邁進的良好開端。鑑於我們仍處於商業化階段的開始，我想重申我在之前的財報電話會議上發表的評論，即我們預計預訂量將在相當長的一段時間內繼續波動。

Moving down the income statement. For Q1 2023, our total operating costs and expenses for the first quarter were $32.3 million, up 60% from $20.2 million in the prior-year period, well within our plan for the year. To break this down further, our research and development costs for the first quarter were $16.2 million, up 121% from $7.3 million in the prior-year period. Recall that we are investing heavily in R&D and, given anticipated demand, are especially focused on investing in our manufacturing capabilities to build more systems than previously anticipated this year.

向下移動損益表。對於 2023 年第一季度，我們第一季度的總運營成本和支出為 3230 萬美元，比去年同期的 2020 萬美元增長 60%，完全符合我們今年的計劃。為了進一步細分，我們第一季度的研發成本為 1620 萬美元，比去年同期的 730 萬美元增長了 121%。回想一下，我們在研發方面投入了大量資金，並且考慮到預期的需求，我們特別專注於投資我們的製造能力，以構建比今年預期更多的系統。

Our sales and marketing costs in the first quarter were $2.7 million, up 43% from $1.9 million in the prior-year period. This increase was due to us growing our go-to market function and additional sales and support personnel as we continue our investment into our commercial efforts.

我們第一季度的銷售和營銷成本為 270 萬美元，比去年同期的 190 萬美元增長了 43%。這一增長是由於我們在繼續投資於我們的商業努力的同時，增加了我們的進入市場功能和額外的銷售和支持人員。

Our general administrative costs in the first quarter were $10.6 million, up 15% from $9.2 million in the prior-year period. All of this resulted in a net loss of $27.3 million in the first quarter compared to $4.2 million in the prior-year period. It's important to note that these results include a non-cash loss of $3.6 million for the first quarter related to the change in fair value of our warrant liabilities.

我們第一季度的一般管理費用為 1060 萬美元，比去年同期的 920 萬美元增長 15%。所有這些導致第一季度淨虧損 2730 萬美元，而去年同期為 420 萬美元。值得注意的是，這些結果包括第一季度與我們的認股權證負債公允價值變化相關的 360 萬美元的非現金損失。

We saw an adjusted EBITDA loss for the first quarter of $15.9 million compared to a $10.3 million loss in the prior-year period. Note that we projected an adjusted EBITDA loss for the year of $80.5 million. So with this quarter's loss, we believe we are still on track to hit our prior 2023 projection.

我們看到第一季度調整後的 EBITDA 虧損為 1,590 萬美元，而去年同期為 1,030 萬美元。請注意，我們預計本年度調整後的 EBITDA 虧損為 8050 萬美元。因此，鑑於本季度的虧損，我們相信我們仍有望實現之前的 2023 年預測。

Turning now to our balance sheet. Cash, cash equivalents, and investments as of March 31, 2023 were $525.5 million. We continue to believe that this cash position, which we believe is the strongest of any quantum pure player, gives us sufficient cash reserves to get to profitability without needing to raise additional funds given our current roadmap.

現在轉向我們的資產負債表。截至 2023 年 3 月 31 日，現金、現金等價物和投資為 5.255 億美元。我們仍然相信，我們認為這種現金狀況是所有純量子參與者中最強的，它為我們提供了足夠的現金儲備來實現盈利，而無需根據我們當前的路線圖籌集額外資金。

Now, turning to our second quarter and full-year 2023 outlook. We are pleased to increase our revenue outlook to $18.8 million to $19.2 million for the full-year 2023. This represents our expectation that we may be able to accelerate delivery against milestones on some of our customer contracts throughout the year. We are maintaining our bookings outlook for the full-year 2023 of $38 million to $42 million, and we are introducing second-quarter revenue guidance of between $4.1 million and $4.5 million. As a reminder, we expect bookings of between $38 million and $42 million for the full-year 2023.

現在，轉向我們的第二季度和 2023 年全年展望。我們很高興將 2023 年全年的收入預期提高到 1,880 萬至 1,920 萬美元。這代表了我們的期望，即我們可能能夠在全年加快交付部分客戶合同的里程碑。我們將 2023 年全年的預訂前景維持在 3800 萬美元至 4200 萬美元之間，並引入了 410 萬美元至 450 萬美元的第二季度收入指引。提醒一下，我們預計 2023 年全年的預訂量在 3800 萬至 4200 萬美元之間。

And with that, I would like to turn the call back over to Peter.

有了這個，我想把電話轉回給彼得。

Clearly, we have been hard at work and executing diligently against our technical and business roadmap. Our early foundations as a company and our underlying trapped-ion architecture are yielding the dividends we expected. The naturally high fidelity of our approach has laid the groundwork for us to begin solving the engineering problems around scalability.

顯然，我們一直在努力工作，並按照我們的技術和業務路線圖努力執行。我們作為一家公司的早期基礎和我們的底層離子阱架構正在產生我們預期的紅利。我們方法的自然高保真度為我們開始解決圍繞可擴展性的工程問題奠定了基礎。

Our technical achievements are driving exceptional demand for more IonQ computers, which we are fulfilling with new systems like Aria 2. Meanwhile, we are trailblazing in system performance and manufacturability. We are seeing excellent progress on the commercial side of the business, adding new customers and adding value to existing ones particularly in the growing area of quantum artificial intelligence. The time to figure out how quantum computing can accelerate your business is now.

我們的技術成就推動了對更多 IonQ 計算機的特殊需求，我們正在通過 Aria 2 等新系統滿足這一需求。同時，我們在系統性能和可製造性方面處於領先地位。我們看到業務的商業方面取得了巨大進步，增加了新客戶並為現有客戶增加了價值，特別是在不斷增長的量子人工智能領域。現在是弄清楚量子計算如何加速您的業務的時候了。

And with that, I would like to turn the call back over to our operator for the Q&A session. Operator?

因此，我想將電話轉回給我們的接線員進行問答環節。操作員？

(Operator Instructions) Scott Fessler, Morgan Stanley.

（操作員說明）斯科特·費斯勒，摩根士丹利。

Congrats on a great quarter. Congrats on adding Aria 2 to the cloud as well. I assume this is a reflection of how well Aria 1 has gone on the cloud. With the achievements you guys have made around Forte, as you said 16 times more powerful than Aria, has there been any discussion of bringing that to the cloud as well?

祝賀一個偉大的季度。恭喜您也將 Aria 2 添加到雲端。我認為這反映了 Aria 1 在雲端的表現如何。鑑於你們圍繞 Forte 取得的成就，正如你們所說的比 Aria 強大 16 倍，有沒有討論過將它也帶到雲端？

Hey, Scott, this is Peter. So certainly, the reason we built Aria 2 was because of demand. And with Forte as well, we are looking at what we want to do next with that. That too, we have customers clamoring to get access to that as well. We haven't made a decision yet as to when we will put it out on the cloud or versus internal. But certainly, the demand for that system seems exceptional as well.

嘿，斯科特，這是彼得。所以當然，我們建造 Aria 2 的原因是因為需求。對於 Forte，我們也在考慮接下來要做什麼。同樣，我們也有客戶吵著要訪問它。我們還沒有決定什麼時候把它放在雲端或內部。但可以肯定的是，對該系統的需求似乎也很特殊。

Thanks. And if I could get a quick follow up in as well. You've discussed on prior calls the expectation of making a full system sale this year, could you maybe discuss any updates around that?

謝謝。如果我也可以快速跟進。您已經在之前的電話中討論過今年進行完整系統銷售的預期，您能否討論一下相關的任何更新？

Well, we're continuing -- there's quite a bit of interest especially as these systems become more powerful as we start to get into AQ 35 and 64, customers understand that means that we're getting to a point where we can do things to get the quantum advantage. And so there's a lot of interest in the systems now, especially now that we've gotten beyond 29. And so we're not ready to report deals closed, but there's obviously conversations going around in the background.

好吧，我們會繼續 - 特別是當我們開始進入 AQ 35 和 64 時這些系統變得更加強大時，人們對此很感興趣，客戶明白這意味著我們已經到了可以做一些事情的地步獲得量子優勢。因此，現在人們對這些系統很感興趣，尤其是現在我們已經超過 29 個。所以我們還沒有準備好報告已完成的交易，但顯然在後台進行了對話。

We should also clarify that we did not actually specify that there would be a system sale in this calendar year, only that we expected one to happen in the next 12 to 24 months, and also that there are elements of hardware sales baked into our forecast. It may or may not be a full system sale. But we continue to see interest in that this from several parties and actually in several segments of the market, so we continue to believe that this is indeed going to happen in a timeframe that we previously mentioned.

我們還應該澄清的是，我們實際上並沒有具體說明在這個日曆年會有系統銷售，只是我們預計會在未來 12 到 24 個月內發生，而且我們的預測中也包含了硬件銷售的因素.它可能是也可能不是完整的系統銷售。但我們繼續看到多方對此感興趣，實際上在市場的幾個部分，所以我們繼續相信這確實會在我們之前提到的時間框架內發生。

Understood. Thank you.

明白了。謝謝。

These are the big ticket sale, so they take a little longer.

這些是大票銷售，所以他們需要更長的時間。

Okay, understood. Thanks.

好的，明白了。謝謝。

Richard Shannon, Craig-Hallum.

理查德·香農，克雷格-哈勒姆。

Thanks for taking my question as well. I guess, my first question is a two-parter here. I realize I'm kind of comparing things that aren't similar, but on the theme of getting Forte 29 AQ ahead of time and then also more tactically or near-term, accelerating some milestones a lot easier to recognize a bit more revenues in the first quarter, what's kind of the dynamics here that's driving this acceleration? Maybe you can kind of compare and contrast any themes that might be consistent over those two dynamics, that'd be great? Thank you.

也謝謝你提出我的問題。我想，我的第一個問題是這裡的兩個部分。我意識到我是在比較不相似的東西，但主題是提前獲得 Forte 29 AQ，然後在戰術上或短期內，加速一些里程碑更容易識別更多的收入第一季度，推動這種加速的動力是什麼？也許您可以比較和對比在這兩種動態中可能一致的任何主題，那會很棒嗎？謝謝。

On the on the technology side, I think we have been making investments for the last few years in thinking about how to continue to improve the performance of our system. And I think that is paying off. It's paying off in a way that we make strides to get to these technical milestones ahead of time.

在技術方面，我認為過去幾年我們一直在進行投資，思考如何繼續提高我們系統的性能。我認為這是有回報的。它以我們提前實現這些技術里程碑的方式取得了回報。

And when it comes to revenue recognition, that reflects the fact that -- two things actually. Earlier, we've had a predominance of Quantum-as-a-Service, which is more or less like SaaS and revenue gets straight line, which means that it will be very simple to forecast. But we have started to move over to a more of a percentage complete type of revenue recognition contract which means that when we're able to start the work earlier and implement more of it earlier, we will also be able to implement or get more revenue recognition early.

當談到收入確認時，這反映了一個事實——實際上有兩件事。早些時候，我們擁有 Quantum-as-a-Service 的優勢，它或多或少類似於 SaaS，收入呈直線增長，這意味著預測起來非常簡單。但我們已經開始轉向更多百分比完成類型的收入確認合同，這意味著當我們能夠更早開始工作並更早實施更多工作時，我們也將能夠實施或獲得更多收入認可早。

And that's what we particularly saw in Q1, and which has been good. And we anticipate that most of that will actually flow through to an increase in the end-of-year revenue. But there are some acceleration that we think that that was merely an acceleration from Q2 to Q1, so it wouldn't persist throughout all the next periods. But we are happy to announce that this does mean that we're able to raise our revenue recognition guidance.

這就是我們在第一季度特別看到的，而且一直很好。我們預計其中大部分實際上會增加年終收入。但是有一些加速，我們認為這僅僅是從第二季度到第一季度的加速，所以它不會在接下來的所有時期都持續存在。但我們很高興地宣布，這確實意味著我們能夠提高收入確認指引。

Okay, fair enough. Thanks for all that detail. My second question is, I assume the last conference call about system sales and whether they be government or academic or commercial customers? And I remember your answer from that, and kind of following-up with one of the previous questions here about systems sales, I've seen some evidence of kind of RFIs for government contracts for, I think, like nine figures kind of dollars here that could include the possibility of quantum hardware sale or some of the potential or earliest possibilities for system sales. Are those related to any government contracts that you're aware of either published or not, are they another kind of other dynamic stride in that interest?

好吧，很公平。感謝所有這些細節。我的第二個問題是，我假設上次電話會議是關於系統銷售的，他們是政府客戶、學術客戶還是商業客戶？我記得你的回答，以及之前關於系統銷售的問題之一，我看到了一些政府合同 RFI 的證據，我認為，就像這裡的九位數美元這可能包括量子硬件銷售的可能性或系統銷售的一些潛在或最早的可能性。這些是否與您所知道的已發布或未發布的任何政府合同相關，它們是否是該興趣的另一種動態進步？

We have interest both in governments, both nationally, internationally, and also enterprise customers when it comes to system sales. So there's interest from multiple parties. And obviously, in both in a national budget point of view, there's quite a bit of money for quantum and systems, and we're competing for those dollars.

在系統銷售方面，我們對國內和國際政府以及企業客戶都感興趣。所以有來自多方的興趣。顯然，從國家預算的角度來看，量子和系統都有相當多的資金，我們正在爭奪這些資金。

Okay, fair enough. Appreciate all the detail guys. Thanks.

好吧，很公平。感謝所有的細節傢伙。謝謝。

Quinn Bolton, Needham and Company.

奎因·博爾頓、李約瑟公司。

This is Trevor on for Quinn. And congrats on the 29 AQ. That's exciting to see. And I guess to start, I know the next goal is 35 AQ in 2024. And I don't want to put pressure on you. But with your progress doing 1 AQ a month, could this milestone be reached in the first half of '24?

這是奎因的特雷弗。並祝賀 29 AQ。看到這真令人興奮。我想開始，我知道下一個目標是 2024 年 35 AQ。我不想給你壓力。但是隨著您每月進行 1 個 AQ 的進展，這個里程碑能否在 24 世紀上半年達到？

So we're not changing the roadmap, but at the same time, obviously, we're executing well, up to this point on hitting the milestones early, and we continue to expect that we will execute well.

所以我們沒有改變路線圖，但與此同時，很明顯，我們執行得很好，到目前為止我們早日達到了里程碑，我們繼續期望我們會執行得很好。

I guess would you say that gap from 29 to 35 is much more difficult from 25 to 29?

我想你會說從 29 到 35 的差距從 25 到 29 更難嗎？

No, the answer is no.

不，答案是否定的。

It is going to be -- in this case, we're increasing by 6. So we'll be 64 times more powerful in terms of the computational space. So there will be some work involved. But we feel quite confident that 35 in 2024 is a goal we can accomplish.

它將是——在這種情況下，我們將增加 6。因此，我們在計算空間方面的功能將增加 64 倍。所以會有一些工作涉及。但我們非常有信心，2024 年達到 35 個是我們可以實現的目標。

There isn't anything major to getting to 35. Just hard work.

達到 35 歲沒有什麼大不了的。只是努力工作。

Okay. And do you expect the integration of the second Aria device in the cloud to have a material impact on revenue growth? I'm trying to get a grasp of the impact that system downtime and waiting queues may have on current revenues and if this system will help alleviate some of those problems.

好的。您是否預計第二台 Aria 設備在雲端的集成會對收入增長產生實質性影響？我試圖了解系統停機和等待隊列可能對當前收入產生的影響，以及該系統是否有助於緩解其中的一些問題。

So it will certainly alleviate the challenge of always having uptime. And this was planned for us because it takes us some amount of time to build these systems. And the revenue from that system is built into our forecast for the year.

因此，它肯定會減輕始終保持正常運行時間的挑戰。這是為我們計劃的，因為我們需要花費一些時間來構建這些系統。該系統的收入已納入我們今年的預測。

Okay, awesome. That's all I have. Thanks, guys.

好的，棒極了。這就是我的全部。多謝你們。

David Williams, Benchmark Company.

大衛·威廉姆斯，Benchmark 公司。

Congrats on these executions and the progress here. I want to touch a little bit just as you think about that transition from 29 to 35. And maybe, or even just to getting to that 29. What are the keys, I guess, what areas are you improving? Is it around the system? Is it the optical side? Is it the IO? Where are the improvements coming from? Or is it just better higher quality qubits during the manufacturing process? Just to understand where this is -- where you're getting the benefits?

祝賀這些處決和這裡的進展。就像您考慮從 29 歲到 35 歲的過渡一樣，我想稍微談談。也許，甚至只是達到 29 歲。我想，關鍵是什麼，您在哪些方面有所改進？是圍繞系統的嗎？是光學方面嗎？是IO嗎？改進來自哪裡？或者它只是在製造過程中更好的更高質量的量子比特？只是為了了解這是哪裡 - 您從哪裡獲得好處？

Yes, as we have said in the past, our qubits are individual atoms, they aren't getting any better. I think it's really about how we control our systems and operate them. So as we have discussed some time ago, Forte actually has an improved optical system to drive our gates, and I think we're really seeing the benefits of that design upgrade. But also, we're actually learning how to operate these systems more optimally. So a lot of this is really coming from improving the quality of our gates, and our ability to run longer circuits without any unexpected degradation in the performance.

是的，正如我們過去所說，我們的量子比特是單個原子，它們並沒有變得更好。我認為這實際上是關於我們如何控制和操作我們的系統。因此，正如我們前段時間所討論的那樣，Forte 實際上有一個改進的光學系統來驅動我們的門，我認為我們確實看到了設計升級的好處。而且，我們實際上正在學習如何更優化地操作這些系統。所以很多這實際上來自於提高我們的門的質量，以及我們運行更長的電路而不會出現任何意外的性能下降的能力。

For the most part, these things are often -- the large part of the benefit is often in software, not in hardware. So we're doing a better job controlling it in software.

在大多數情況下，這些東西通常是 - 大部分好處通常是在軟件中，而不是在硬件中。所以我們在軟件中做得更好。

Okay, very helpful. Thanks. Thanks. So I'm sure there's quite a few areas within that topology that you can tweak to gain that performance as well. Is that correct assumption?

好的，很有幫助。謝謝。謝謝。所以我敢肯定，您可以調整該拓撲中的很多區域以獲得該性能。這是正確的假設嗎？

That is certainly correct. I mean, there's -- all the hardware is under control of software, so how good a job you do, everything from pulse shaping of light to the timing and all the rest of that fall under control. So we can build a better piece of software, then we can get better performance out of this. Sometimes it requires hardware changes every once awhile. If somebody says, hey, we could replace X,Y, and Z, and we can get better, but it's often mostly in software.

這當然是正確的。我的意思是，所有的硬件都在軟件的控制之下，所以你做得有多好，從光的脈衝整形到時間的一切都在控制之中。所以我們可以構建一個更好的軟件，然後我們可以從中獲得更好的性能。有時它需要每隔一段時間更換一次硬件。如果有人說，嘿，我們可以替換 X、Y 和 Z，我們可以變得更好，但這通常主要是在軟件方面。

Okay, very good. And then I guess lastly for me, maybe it's a two-part, but just kind of thinking about the AI regulation has been proposed. How do you see that? And then secondly, can you kind of talk about maybe what Pat does in terms of your R&D efforts and what your expectations are there?

好的，非常好。然後我想最後對我來說，也許它分為兩部分，但只是提出了關於 AI 法規的思考。你怎麼看？其次，您能否談談 Pat 在您的研發工作方面所做的工作以及您的期望是什麼？

Yes. So there are obviously -- the regulations for AI we expect as we get into that field more that some part of that would be -- control kind of what we do in the future. And we're supportive of an intelligent government regulation. I'm not sure if that -- does that exist? But you get the concept.

是的。因此，很明顯——當我們進入該領域時，我們期望的人工智能法規會更多地控制我們未來所做的事情。我們支持明智的政府監管。我不確定那是否存在？但是你明白了。

And then Pat's experience at Lab126, Lab126 was the group that did all the hardware for Amazon. And prior to Lab126, he was over at Apple working on their hardware. So he very much has both R&D background, physics background, and also very much a product background. He's used to helping build real products.

然後是 Pat 在 Lab126 的經歷，Lab126 是為亞馬遜做所有硬件的團隊。在 Lab126 之前，他在 Apple 從事硬件方面的工作。所以他非常有研發背景、物理背景，也有非常多的產品背景。他習慣於幫助構建真正的產品。

And if you look at the evolution of IonQ, we kind of started off as an academic organization. We're moving to an engineering organization, and now the next -- the last transformation is to a product organization.

如果你看一下 IonQ 的演變，我們最初是作為一個學術組織起步的。我們正在轉向一個工程組織，現在下一個——最後一個轉變是轉向一個產品組織。

Pat is going to take on the challenges related to R&D that have a little bit longer timeframe. The engineering organization is always being pressed to build that next system to hit the next AQ number. And Pat will have a little more time. His time horizons is probably closer to three to four to five years. So he can take on more ambitious goals, which are necessary to be able to hit numbers beyond AQ 64.

Pat 將接受與研發相關的挑戰，這些挑戰的時間框架稍長一些。工程組織總是被迫構建下一個系統以達到下一個 AQ 編號。帕特還有更多時間。他的時間範圍可能接近三到四到五年。因此他可以承擔更雄心勃勃的目標，這些目標對於能夠達到 AQ 64 以上的數字是必要的。

(Operator Instructions) Scott Fessler, Morgan Stanley.

（操作員說明）斯科特·費斯勒，摩根士丹利。

Yes, thanks for the additional question. So as your existing contracts start to roll off over the next year or two, we'll call it, how should we expect pricing to change maybe gen over gen as you offer some way more higher powered hardware to your customers?

是的，感謝您的補充問題。因此，隨著您現有的合同在未來一兩年內開始到期，我們稱之為，隨著您為客戶提供更高功率的硬件，我們應該如何預期價格可能會發生變化？

Now that is an excellent question. What we like to see is that we provide more value to our customers. And we want to continue to create more and more value. We don't think that this is time to start gouging our customers, we want actually to partner with them. But there's definitely room for price to drift up as we provide more and more value to the market.

現在這是一個很好的問題。我們希望看到的是我們為客戶提供更多價值。我們希望繼續創造越來越多的價值。我們認為現在不是開始欺騙我們客戶的時候，我們真的想與他們合作。但隨著我們為市場提供越來越多的價值，價格肯定有上漲的空間。

And like any kind of traditional hardware, what you're seeing is kind of last year's hardware is being offered more cheaply. And the latest generation is usually at least as expensive, maybe more, especially here where you've got such huge leaps in computational power.

和任何一種傳統硬件一樣，你所看到的是去年的硬件正在以更便宜的價格提供。最新一代通常至少同樣昂貴，也許更貴，尤其是在計算能力有瞭如此巨大飛躍的地方。

Got it. And then one more if time allows. As you move from 29 AQ to 35 next year, can you just talk about some of the big headline applications that you think open up once you hit that 35 AQ number?

知道了。如果時間允許，然後再來一個。當你明年從 29 AQ 升至 35 時，你能談談你認為一旦你達到 35 AQ 數字就會打開的一些大頭條應用程序嗎？

It's very much quantum machine learning, is the things that we think in roughly 35. So we are investing heavily on the application side. The other aspect that we expect is not just in ML, but also in AGI. So we started investment in investigation more than a year ago, which was the first part of that was the paper we just produced, which ran on our hardware, but we're investing in that as well.

這是非常多的量子機器學習，我們認為大約有 35 個東西。所以我們在應用程序方面進行了大量投資。我們期望的另一個方面不僅在 ML 中，而且在 AGI 中。所以我們在一年多前開始投資調查，這是我們剛剛製作的論文的第一部分，它在我們的硬件上運行，但我們也在投資。

So we expect strong AI or AGI to be even better on quantum hardware going forward. So I don't know yet if 35 will be enough, but we're investing in that. We do feel very strongly that in QML, quantum ML, that you'll start to see quantum advantage in those applications.

因此，我們預計強人工智能或通用人工智能在未來的量子硬件上會更好。所以我還不知道 35 是否足夠，但我們正在對此進行投資。我們確實非常強烈地感覺到，在 QML、量子 ML 中，您將開始在這些應用程序中看到量子優勢。

Thank you for that. Appreciate it.

謝謝你。欣賞它。

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we have reached the end of the question-and-answer session. I'd like to turn the call back to Peter Chapman for closing remarks.

謝謝。女士們，先生們，我們的問答環節已經結束。我想將電話轉回給 Peter Chapman 以作結束語。

I want to thank everyone for joining us today. And thank you for all the thoughtful questions. Finally, I want to thank the entire IonQ team for their hard and diligent work that allowed us to achieve the key technical and business milestones including 29 AQ this quarter. We truly believe that we're changing the world one day at a time. And I look forward to speaking with all of you very soon. Thank you.

我要感謝大家今天加入我們。感謝您提出所有深思熟慮的問題。最後，我要感謝整個 IonQ 團隊的辛勤工作，使我們能夠在本季度實現包括 29 AQ 在內的關鍵技術和業務里程碑。我們堅信我們每天都在改變世界。我期待很快與大家交談。謝謝。

Thank you. This concludes today's conference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.

謝謝。今天的會議到此結束。此時您可以斷開線路。感謝您的參與。