The US Department of Commerce said on May 21 that it had signed letters of intent to put $2.013 billion into nine quantum computing companies in exchange for minority, non-controlling equity stakes, and over the past two weeks those letters have started converting into signed contracts.

D-Wave finalized its agreement on September 9 for up to $100 million in CHIPS and Science Act funding, following Quantinuum’s own finalized pact a day earlier and a similar deal with Rigetti. The letters-of-intent-to-contract pipeline is now working through the rest of the list.

The money splits two ways. Two companies are being funded to build the physical manufacturing base the industry lacks: GlobalFoundries is getting $375 million to build a…