Preeti Chalsani, Chief Quantum Officer at Intersect Illinois, and Harley Johnson, CEO of the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park, are interviewed by Yuval Boger. Preeti and Harley discuss the rapid creation and ambitious goals of the IQMP, a state-backed initiative to support the scale-up of quantum computing and microelectronics. They talk about the park’s public-private structure, a $500M infrastructure investment by the state, early tenants like PsiQuantum and and Diraq, and its emphasis on workforce development and cross-sector collaboration. They also explore Illinois’ unique advantages as well as the challenges of infrastructure timelines, community impact, managing expectations in a fast-moving field, and much more.
Transcript:
Yuval Boger: Hello Preeti, hello Harley. Thank you very much for joining me today. Hello, it’s great to be here with you.
Preeti Chalsani: Thanks for having us, Yuval.
Yuval:So Preeti, who are you and what do you do?
Preeti:So I’m Preeti Chalsani. I’m currently serving as the Chief Quantum Officer at Intersect Illinois, leading business development for quantum and adjacent industries for the state of Illinois, as well as for the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park. And for those who don’t know, Intersect Illinois is the state’s business and economic development arm, so charged with bringing economic growth, jobs, investments, and companies to the state.
Yuval:And Harley, how about you? Who are you and what do you do?
Harley Johnson: I’m Harley Johnson. I’m a professor of mechanical science and engineering and materials science at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. And I’m also the director and CEO of the new Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park in Chicago.
Yuval:So let’s start with the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park in Chicago. When did that idea start and how’s it going?
Harley:Well, it’s going great and we’re enjoying a lot of momentum right now and making a lot of progress. It started about a year and a half or two years ago as an idea that arose from an exercise that a group of us carried out. We were thinking about how to better position and create opportunities for researchers and companies in the state of Illinois around emerging opportunities, especially in the federal government, related to the Chips and Science Act funding that was announced back in 2022-ish. And we looked at strengths and weaknesses for the state of Illinois and all of our research institutions and the industry sectors that we have positioned ourselves already and saw a real opportunity to double down on what was already a lot of strength in the area of quantum broadly, QIS broadly, but in particular quantum computing. And so about a year and a half ago, we began thinking about how to leverage some state investment and position ourselves to attract companies and to attract federal investment. And that led to the idea of a research park or industrial park dedicated to scale up of quantum computing. that’s when the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park was born as a vision. Then it really formally came together and was publicly launched in July of 2024, so just about a year ago.
Yuval:How is the park related to Intersect Quantum or the other quantum-related organizations in Illinois?
Preeti:Intersect Illinois is a statewide economic development arm. We focus on all industries, not just quantum. My area of efforts relate to quantum. That’s my portfolio. And so I’m leading business development for the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park. But you’re right that the IQMP involves all of the other quantum organizations in this state, including, Harley mentioned the University of Illinois, and Harley’s maybe a better place to explain this, but the IQMP is managed by a board that includes not just University Illinois but also University of Chicago, Northwestern, Fermi in Argonne, Chicago State University, all of our regions, universities and research institutions that are involved in quantum. But maybe I’ll turn it over to Harley to explain a bit more about how the organization works.
Harley:>> Sure, right. So the park is really a huge public-private partnership, and so it was initially funded and has been launched by support from the state of Illinois, but it’s being organized and governed by really all of our research institutions, many other higher educational institutions, and also some of the economic development organizations like Intersect Illinois that the Preeti represents. So it’s a partnership that is really dedicated to creating conditions for companies to scale up their operations and to enhance R&D infrastructure broadly. So it could be infrastructure that could be used by universities or by the national labs as well. But just sort of with this focus around quantum computing. And otherwise, it looks like a kind of a conventional sort of research park model that you find in different parts of the country. But we have this really singular focus around scale-up of quantum computing.
Yuval:What companies are already part of the park? And what type of companies, other than being related to quantum, are you looking to add?
Preeti:So the first company that was announced at the park was PsiQuantum, which as you know, you all is a photonic quantum computing company based out of Silicon Valley, but looking to build a utility scale computer at a much larger scale in a different location. and after a long process settled on Chicago as a place where they could get everything that they needed for this effort. Since then, we’ve also announced IBM as one of the partners with presence on the park. IBM will also host their next-gen computer, like the Quantum System 2 at the park, making it available to users over the cloud and specifically to the National Quantum Algorithm Center, which will also be on the park and have other quantum companies as well as other companies across different industry sectors. In addition to IBM, Diraq, which is an Australian quantum computing company, will also be at the park and we’re in discussions with several others. And very importantly, it’s a good question you asked, it’s not just quantum computing companies. We’re also working with other companies who build enabling technologies or related technologies, like you’re building components for quantum sensors or for quantum communication, cryostats, other things that are involved in this effort. So we’re definitely interested in building a full ecosystem of companies. We are working with other organizations. We’re also focused on things like workforce development, but also very relevant to be in the park to leverage other activities of the park and to create future, you know, workforce pipelines, for example.
Yuval:- There are other regions in the States that also have fantastic academic institutions, sometimes better weather. Colorado comes to mind. Massachusetts has a developed ecosystem. Why should people come to Illinois as opposed to one of the other hubs?
Harley:I’ll take a shot at that. And I know Preeti also has lots to say about it as well. Yes, there are definitely some great other regions that are really doing great things in quantum. No question about that. And we have strong connections across the country with companies and with academic institutions in some of these other regions. I think what we have here is very special. We have the advantage of really the leading academic institutions close together and the two major national labs that both of which have really major presence in quantum i think you know between U Chicago, Argonne, FermiLab and the four quantum institutes that we host that there’s a concentration of federal funding in basic science and basic research in quantum that doesn’t exist anywhere else. So we have that sort of to start with. I think there are a couple of other things. One is a state that has really committed itself to being, to supporting this and being innovative and put its investments behind that commitment. It’s real dollars having been appropriated by the General Assembly of the state of Illinois to support this at a very high level. And we’re just grateful for that support. And we think it’s visionary because it can allow us to do great things, to push the technology forward, but also to grow the economy here and in the region, not just in the city or the state, but just regionally because we’re also well-connected to Wisconsin and beyond, and Michigan as well. The other thing I would add is that, and Preeti mentioned this a little bit, the workforce, the strengths that we bring to sort of growing the workforce in this area. The number of graduates that are coming out of our programs, both, you know, sort of at the like graduate degree level and, and the really unique graduate programs we have, like at University of Chicago, they have a quantum, uh, quantum engineering program. University of Illinois, we have just a huge number of students coming out and then the large community college systems and so on. So you know that I think this is something we’re hearing from companies they’re very excited about is just that the number of students coming into the ecosystem every year. And you know we like to do big things here in Illinois and in Chicago there’s a kind of a tradition of that. So I think these things kind of come together and that we’re we we’ve gotten a really strong response from companies who come to see that and the last thing I’ll say is that it is not easy o get all of those um partners to work together right and and we’ve that’s that is probably at sort of at an abstract level that’s probably what we put the most effort into it’s getting all of these stakeholders the community colleges the the state universities the private universities the national labs um to kind of move in the same direction and And we are all definitely moving in the same direction. So that I think, you know, that starts to pay off as you can kind of harness that.
Yuval:Say there’s a a UK company that wants to open an office in the US. Who should they reach out to? Are these incentives sort of backroom deals or is there sort of a well understood menu of what a company could get. Maybe Priyadhi, you could talk about that.
Preeti:Sure, yeah. So they can certainly reach out to me. I think my contact information is for good or bad available publicly on the IQMP website and things like that. And all of this is really meant to be, everything that we’re doing is very public and we have publicly available lists of resources that we can provide. And in addition to that, of course, we do a lot of concierge type work and making connections to professional services, universities, national labs, construction companies, whatever it is you need. We take real pride in that. And the direction to do that comes from the governor on down, like this idea that you will help whoever’s coming with whatever it is they need. I also just wanted to add another thing to, you know, this idea of why this region is different. So yes, agreeing with Hartley and agreeing with you that we have foundational assets here like our universities, the actual labs that are also, you know, other regions have that too. But I think the difference is the kind of the ecosystem catalysts and this idea of doing things together and having the vision to do things together. And I think we started doing that really early on, things like the Chicago Quantum Exchange established in 2017 to work, to bring the ecosystem together. Now, many other regions are doing that, but I think I really feel like that sort of started in a very Midwestern way in the Midwest. I really think that’s an advantage. And the other thing that I think should not be underestimated is What we have here, like Illinois is like the fifth largest economy in the US. So it’s a considerably large economic machine. And it has a really diverse industry base. So everything from manufacturing, automotive, life sciences, transportation, logistics, obviously tech. And that’s not, that is really valuable when you’re thinking about an emerging industry. When you’re at the stage where you’re exploring applications, it’s not an established industry, the applications aren’t all known. Having access to all these different potential end users, where you can partner with them to do pilots, proof of concepts, explore viability of technologies, that’s really crucial. And having access to that right in the region, that’s not something that happens easily elsewhere. And I think we’re leveraging that benefit that we have.
Yuval:If I heard you correctly, Harley, the park came together very quickly, at least relative to how I think about other similar projects and is progressing very well. But what are you worried about? What do you think could derail the success that you’ve been having?
Harley: So, you know, we are trying to do something really big and something that hasn’t been done before, and you always worry about the unknowns. I think that some of the timelines are aggressive, and trying to build physical infrastructure on an aggressive timeline has just got lots of lots of challenges and and you know we’re I would say confronting those and taking one at a time but you know in this industry there are supply chain issues we talk about supply chain fragility and and reliance on you know it’s sort of global links in the supply chain and that we don’t really have a lot of control over sometimes so you we’re leaning on all partners and all kind of resources we can to keep making forward progress on building industrial scale cryo plant and rehabbing a major former industrial site and getting that ready to occupy. So there are definitely challenges that you can envision that relate to that, just building something big and doing it fast. We are thrilled with and celebrating all of the advances that we’re seeing across the quantum industry over the last 18 months. We’re working with companies that span the range of different quantum computing modalities and we’re cheering for all of them and we want them to all find ways to succeed either with us or with other ecosystems around the country. But I think what we’re seeing is forward motion on a lot of these things. And we’re working closely with DARPA and their quantum benchmarking initiative and kind of adopting the same point of view, which is that we’re agnostic to the technology. we’re here to sort of help companies prove out their claims and kind of demonstrate the success of their technology. So I would say we’re not, in terms of barriers, we’re not worried about modality A versus modality B. We’re trying to create infrastructure that’ll support the whole range. I think, you know, there’s, there’s like, uh, we have to guard against hype in, in, um, you know, as we, as we tell the story about, um, you know, the, the end use cases that, that quantum computing could enable. And so we’re trying to be, you know, practical, realistic about that at the same time as bringing in all the, a lot of the end use companies that, that want to an algorithm center that we’re building out as you know sort of to complement all the work on hardware. So we’re trying to be a good partner to those end user companies that you know show them what things can you know what the promise but without overhyping things. So that’s you know that’s one thing that we worry about a little bit is that people get carried away and expectations are set too high. But I think so far that’s going reasonably well. I think those are some of the things, but it’s just an ambitious project to try to build this so quickly and it makes it fun. But there are lots of logistical challenges to doing it.
Yuval:Let’s talk a little bit about numbers. maybe either or both of you can give me both a sense of how much the state is investing, is it real money, is it matching funds, is it tax breaks, and also in terms of your vision, you know, three years or five years from now, what would you like that center to be? How many people would be employed there? What does success look like for you?
Harley:So, I’ll say a little bit and start because I wanted to add one other thing that I’m worried about.
I just remembered it should be mentioned. The investment, we talk about $500 million appropriation from FY24 by the state of Illinois. That’s real money. That’s real dollars that are flowing into the project in different categories. Almost all of that is direct funding and not matching funds. I mean, some of that, there’s a fraction of that that is matching funds that are committed to matching what DARPA is bringing to companies who will locate here. And then there are some additional investments that are, that are beyond that $500 million, that, that are things like tax incentives and workforce development incentives, grants to companies, uh, who bring a certain number of, uh, workers to the state. And so that, that, you know, that makes the total much larger. So, I mean, it depends on how you count everything, but that we were starting with a $500 million appropriation of, of real dollars. And then beyond that is tax incentives and so on. You know, a lot of these things are intended to grow, and this is where I’ll get to this one of the thing that I, you know, that we, we worry about A lot of these things are intended to grow the economy and some of the contributions are coming from the city of Chicago, Cook County, because of the need that we all recognize to invest in this part of the city on the south side of Chicago, formerly heavily industrial site that has not been invested in for a long time. So we feel a real sense of responsibility to the community to make the most of these public dollars that are going into this. And that’s something that I would say we worry about. We want to deliver so badly some economic wins for the South side of Chicago and to be responsible to the community that has been disappointed over the years by projects that have failed. So that’s the one other thing I wanted to add, is just the sense of responsibility we fill the community because we are spending a lot of public money to make this work. But Preeti can maybe add some color to maybe some of the categories of money and how some of these incentives work.
Preeti:Yeah, just to kind of connect to what Harley had mentioned that this whole initiative is based on a very real 500 million dollar investment from the state. And from my perspective, what’s interesting is that that investment is almost all for infrastructure. And I’m sure you would agree with me well for companies in this space, startups trying to get these technologies into the hands of customers into products. It’s really like the infrastructure piece is the hardest thing like it, it’s the most capital intensive, and it also takes long times to get that set up. So the fact that the state is sort of putting their support behind that, I think is exciting and hopefully really productive for the startups who are working here. The other thing the state has done is kind of think carefully about what kinds of incentives are useful to companies in the early stages, pre-revenue. This is a deep tech effort. It’s going to be a while before where where the semiconductor industry is, for example. So you need to make a difference where it really matters. And so the way the state has thought about incentives is not in terms of tax credits based on profits but really things like payroll, which everybody who has a paycheck coming from and a corporate entity is required to pay state income taxes, for example. And these incentives allow the company to retain some of that for the company’s own benefits or own priorities. There’s a number of different things like that that the state has crafted that is intended to help companies at this stage of development. So I’m really hopeful that it will make a difference, that in four or five years when we look around, it will be a much denser ecosystem with many more players at all stages, like early stages just coming out of research labs, as well as companies that are more advanced, like Quora, like Quantum, like IBM, and that it will bring others, other companies who are working in the supply chain, who are building things that will enable quantum efforts, as well as end users, so companies in the energy space or automotive who might be users of these technologies. I definitely see that already happening, the amount of interest and sort of sustained engagement we see from these interested parties is very interesting. And I believe that it will be a real hub of quantum activity, both commercial and research, and the whole spectrum in five years.
Yuval:You mentioned that IBM is going to build one of their computers there, and I think, PsiQuantum, that’s why you need all these cryogenics, I believe. I think that quantum computers will ultimately be useful together with classical supercomputers.
Preeti:- Absolutely.
Yuval:- I don’t think a lot of people think that the QPU will just completely replace the GPU or CPU.
Preeti:It’s certainly not going to replace it. And also it’s not going to be used in isolation. Like it’s definitely something where you use them together. Yes.
Yuval:So wouldn’t it make sense to actually build that center, say in the University of Urbana-Champaign next to NCSA or, or a supercomputing center, or, or is there a plan to bring a classical supercomputer to the South side?
Harley:Yeah. So now this is an interesting point. And, and I would say that the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and University of Chicago are both, uh, really engaged in thinking about where hardware goes. What’s the most, what’s the optimal, you know, arrangement for the hardware that we’re, uh, we’re setting up. Um, there, there is a, there is a reasoning behind trying to co-locate things, uh, at one campus. And we think that to the extent that that’s helpful to have algorithms, people near hardware and some of the GPUs near QPUs and so on, we think that the Quantum Park is the logical place for that. But there is definitely a role for a major research university to have co-located resources. And University of Chicago is going to be part of that plan, and then University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign is part of that plan. So yeah, you’d make a really compelling point. I mean, that’s also where a lot of the research is happening, obviously. So this is one of the reasons why we wanna, we’re building a park in proximity to the universities so that we’re not far away.
Preeti:- But yeah, and more specifically, Yuval, you’re exactly right that we also need to think about the non-quantum compute resources that are needed in conjunction with quantum computing. and we’re having some very serious, lengthy, detailed discussions about how to do this, and that’s definitely gonna happen.
Yuval:I know Preeti for a number of years through CQE and other Chicago activities. Harley, I think this is the first time we’re meeting, and I’m intrigued how a university professor becomes CEO of a park where you have to worry about construction and permits and the things that are not what one would typically associate with professorship. Would you tell me about your background, both your academic interest and how you got to this job?
Harley:Sure, yeah, no, thank you for that question. It’s again an insightful question. So I’ve been a professor here in Urbana-Champaign for almost 25 years. my research goes back to working on silicon quantum dots in the 90s. So before we were even really calling them quantum dots, they were just sort of nano things. And you know, I’ve been interested in photonics and you know, different kinds of quantum materials. Now I’m working on topological materials and these kinds of things in my research. And my research is computational, so I use high-performance computing. And so I’m very interested in new computing but I’m also interested in the materials that are a part of this growing industry. So I have an interest in it and some background there. But the last five years I’ve served in addition to my sort of regular professor job, I served as the associate dean for research across engineering in UIUC. And so I worked on setting up big federally funded projects, worked on corporate relations and corporate partnerships and building state economic development, uh, planning. And, uh, that was just part of what I did, uh, on the side. And then my interests in some of those large partnership and large kind of infrastructure projects sort of merged with my academic interests when we built the plan for this research park. So it’s just been an exciting chapter and, you know, it’s been an interesting ride to to as you as you noted, like taking on things related to construction, permitting and so on. But, you know, we have a huge team and the role of the organization that I lead is really to provide connectivity, you know, between the developer and the construction teams and the companies who are joining us and so on. I mean, I’m not, uh, fortunately for everyone, I’m not out on the construction site, um, operating the, the cranes, um, because I don’t know anything about construction, but, it is a role that, you know, I think is needed in a big public private partnership, like we’re trying to set up.
Yuval:As we wrap up our conversation today, I wanted to ask you individually a hypothetical If you could have dinner with one of the quantum greats, dead or alive, who would that be? Harley maybe you go first and then Preeti?
Harley:Sure I had a feeling this question was coming Yuval. I’ve done my homework.
Preeti:How come? I didn’t know.
Harley:You didn’t know? Okay well this is a great question and I’ve… but I want to say like I you know Richard Feynman I know that probably everybody says Richard Feynman. Very intriguing character and I definitely would be interested. But you know, I guess I don’t have a favorite from the all-time sort of pantheon of quantum people. I would be looking more to probably an engineer, since I’m an engineer, and maybe an engineer who’s worked on big projects for the public good. of my engineering idols is Jimmy Carter, the former US president, who, like me, also studied at Georgia Tech. So I’ll say Jimmy Carter because he would have a lot of interesting things to say.
Preeti:Very interesting. So I was going to lean Harley’s way and go with, you know, one of the more recent people involved in more recent efforts. But I’m going to go the other way. And I think I would like this is, you know, the International Year of Quantum, a hundred years from what we call the beginnings of quantum. And I think it would be very interesting to be able to have a discussion with Bohr, Heisenberg, or Schrodinger, just really understand. and I know there’s many plays and books written about this, but the idea of quantum and how it, how they grappled with it and how they accepted it, I think that’s really fascinating. And really, you know, so much more has happened since then, like having a front row seat to that sort of mental exercise I think would be really fascinating.
Yuval:- Wonderful. So Preeti, Harley, thank you so much for joining us today.