OVHcloud makes Pasqal quantum processors available. New service launches

French cloud provider OVHcloud has just made the most decisive move to make the Old Continent independent of US computing technology. The launch of its new Quantum-as-a-Service platform is not only a technology launch, but above all a signal that Europe intends to build its own sovereign ecosystem in the nascent quantum computing sector.

The Roubaix-based company has granted organisations access to the Orion Beta QPU processor, supplied by French startup Pasqal. This is the first step in an aggressive strategy to integrate at least eight quantum systems by the end of 2027. Significantly from a geopolitical perspective, up to seven of these are to come from European suppliers. Pasqal, as lead partner, sees this collaboration as the foundation for building a ‘digital autonomy’ in which both hardware and cloud infrastructure remain within EU jurisdiction.

From a business perspective, OVHcloud’s offering stands out for its pragmatic approach to a still experimental technology. The provider combines access to a physical QPU with a set of nine quantum emulators, which are already used by nearly a thousand developers. This hybrid architecture allows companies to safely test algorithms and validate use cases in a cloud environment, without having to invest in expensive in-house lab infrastructure. Although about “quantum supremacy” – the moment when quantum computers will permanently surpass classical machines – may not yet be in sight, OVHcloud wants to be ready for that moment by offering an environment for iteration and learning now.

The French move is a direct response to the dominance of US hyperscalers. IBM with its Quantum Cloud, Microsoft Azure with its Majorana 1 processor, AWS Braket or Google, have been building a competitive advantage overseas for years. OVHcloud is entering this market late, but with a clear value proposition: it offers the first viable alternative to ensure that sensitive research and data does not leave the European economic area. In an era of increasing regulatory tensions and pressure on data sovereignty, this could be a key asset in the battle for public, financial and research customers.

The choice between Pasqal’s technology and IBM’s solutions is not just a question of supplier, but a decision about the fundamental physical architecture. Although both companies are pursuing the same goal – stable quantum computing – they approach the problem from completely different sides of the physics.

IBM and the Superconducting Qubits approach

IBM, like Google, is betting on superconducting qubits. These are essentially macroscopic electronic circuits that, when cooled to near absolute zero temperatures (in large dilution chillers), exhibit quantum properties. This approach is currently the most mature in engineering. Its greatest advantage is the speed of operations – quantum gates operate extremely fast here.

However, it has the disadvantages of a short coherence time (the time it takes for a qubit to ‘remember’ its state) and difficulties with scaling. Each qubit must be physically connected to the control electronics, which, with thousands of qubits, creates a ‘wiring nightmare’ and generates heat, which is the enemy of the quantum state.

Pasqal and the Neutral Atoms approach

France’s Pasqal (and indirectly OVHcloud) uses rubidium atoms suspended in a vacuum and held by high-precision lasers called optical tweezers. In this system, the atoms themselves are the qubits. Since the atoms are identical by nature, this eliminates errors due to imperfections in chip manufacturing, something IBM has been facing.

A key advantage of Pasqal technology is scalability and connectivity. The lasers can arrange atoms into any three-dimensional shape, allowing complex chemical molecules or optimisation problems to be simulated in a way that is inaccessible to IBM’s rigid chip architecture. These systems can operate at room temperature (for the apparatus itself, although the atoms are laser-cooled), which drastically reduces energy costs. The disadvantage is slower execution times compared to superconductors.