IBM, 양자컴퓨팅 분야 $10억 지원받아 주목받을 전망
IBM Missed the Bus on AI. New Federal Funding Means IBM Stock Could Be a Winner in Quantum Computing.
IBM이 양자 컴퓨팅 분야에 10억 달러의 연방 자금을 확보한 것은 인공지능 분야에서 뒤처진 상황에서도 강력한 성장 동력이 될 수 있습니다.
핵심 요약
IBM 주가 0.5% 상승 중이지만, 양자컴퓨팅 분야에 $10억 지원금이 배정되어 주목받을 전망입니다.
핵심요약
- IBM 주가 연초부터 0.5% 상승, 52주간 14% 증가
- CHIPS and Science Act에 따라 $10억 연방 지원금 확보
- Anderon 설립으로 양자컴퓨팅 분야 선점 가능성
- IBM, 양자컴퓨팅 기술 개발에 50년 이상 투자
- Albany, 뉴욕에 본사 설립 예정
도입
IBM의 최신 양자컴퓨팅 분야 진출은 AI 부문에서의 약진에 비해 상대적으로 주목받지 못했지만, 연방 정부의 지원금과 IBM의 기술 역량을 고려할 때, 장기적인 성장 가능성을 암시합니다. 이는 투자자에게 새로운 투자 기회를 제공할 수 있는 중요한 신호입니다.
본문 1: 연방 지원금의 전략적 의미
연방 정부의 $10억 지원금은 IBM이 양자컴퓨팅 분야에서 선두주자로 자리매김할 수 있는 중요한 계기가 될 수 있습니다. 이 지원금은 IBM이 Anderon을 설립하여 양자컴퓨팅 칩 제조를 주도할 수 있도록 지원할 것입니다. IBM이 이 자금을 활용하여 기술 개발을 가속화하면, 향후 양자컴퓨팅 시장에서의 경쟁력을 강화할 수 있을 것입니다. 이는 IBM의 장기적인 성장 전망을 높이는 요소로 작용할 수 있습니다.
본문 2: 기술 역량과 시장 기회
IBM은 양자컴퓨팅 기술 개발에 50년 이상 투자해 온 역사가 있습니다. 특히, 트랜스몬 큐비트 등의 핵심 기술 개발에 기여해 온 점은 IBM이 양자컴퓨팅 분야에서 이미 강력한 기술 역량을 보유하고 있음을 보여줍니다. 이러한 기술 역량은 Anderon의 설립과 결합되어, 향후 양자컴퓨팅 시장에서의 시장 기회를 확대할 수 있을 것입니다. 이는 IBM의 주가 상승에 긍정적인 영향을 미칠 수 있는 중요한 요소입니다.
본문 3: 리스크 요인
다만, 양자컴퓨팅 기술은 아직 초기 단계에 있으며, 기술적 및 상업적 성공을 보장하지는 않습니다. 또한, 경쟁사들의 기술 개발 속도와 정부의 정책 변화에 따라 IBM의 전략이 변화할 수 있는 리스크가 있습니다. 이러한 리스크를 고려할 때, 투자자는 장기적인 관점에서 IBM의 기술 개발 동향과 시장 반응을 주의 깊게 관찰해야 할 것입니다.
결론
IBM의 최신 양자컴퓨팅 분야 진출은 AI 부문의 약진에 비해 주목받지 못했지만, 연방 정부의 지원금과 기술 역량을 고려할 때, 장기적인 성장 가능성을 암시합니다. 향후 IBM의 기술 개발 동향과 시장 반응을 주의 깊게 관찰하는 것이 중요합니다. 특히, Anderon의 설립과 양자컴퓨팅 기술의 상용화 가능성에 주목할 필요가 있습니다.
Original Article
IBM Missed the Bus on AI. New Federal Funding Means IBM Stock Could Be a Winner in Quantum Computing.
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International Business Machines (IBM) , more commonly known as IBM, is not hogging any significant spotlight in the current era of artificial intelligence (AI). Unsurprisingly, while shares of Nvidia (NVDA) , Broadcom (AVGO) , Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) , and others have rallied like there's no tomorrow, IBM stock has traded as a laggard. Shares of IBM are up just 0.5% on a year-to-date (YTD) basis and about 14% over the past 52 weeks.
However, while IBM may have missed the bus in terms of AI, it surely doesn't want to miss the next big thing. To that end, one recent development just boosted the company's prospects in the quantum computing space.
Under the CHIPS and Science Act, the federal government is set to grant $1 billion to IBM to set up a quantum computing chip manufacturing company. Named Anderon, IBM claims that it will be first U.S. pure-play quantum foundry. IBM itself will match the contribution while providing personnel and other assets for the company, which will be based out of Albany, New York.
“IBM has pioneered quantum computing for decades,” said CEO Arvind Krishna on the news. "Our work in silicon wafer fabrication has been a key to IBM's success and will be critical to enable a broader quantum technology landscape that will reshape global innovation and economic competitiveness. With the support of the U.S. Department of Commerce, Anderon will be well-positioned to fuel America's fast-growing quantum technology industry."
While quantum computing has been garnering attention in recent years, IBM has actually been at it for more than five decades now. In fact, many of the field's most important technical achievements — including the development of the transmon qubit — were built in part by IBM.
The company's public-facing journey began in earnest in 2016, when it placed the first quantum processor on the cloud . Most recently, at the Quantum Developer Conference in November 2025, IBM unveiled the Nighthawk processor and its experimental Loon chip, which demonstrated "all hardware elements of fault-tolerant quantum computing" while also proving real-time error decoding in under 480 nanoseconds.
Notably, the Nighthawk processor features 120 qubits and 218 next-generation tunable couplers, with a software stack delivering 24% accuracy improvements for dynamic circuits and over 100 times lower cost for HPC-powered error mitigation. Competing companies like IonQ (IONQ) use trapped ion technology while D-Wave (QBTS) specializes in quantum annealing for optimization problems, both of which target narrower use cases than IBM's superconducting approach. IBM's roadmap targets quantum advantage by the end of 2026 and the world's first large-scale fault-tolerant quantum computer, codenamed Starling , by 2029. That's a timeline no pure-play competitor has articulated with comparable hardware evidence behind it.
Still, issues persist. The most pertinent is the difficulty of converting extraordinary engineering milestones into predictable enterprise revenue before competitors close the hardware gap. Moreover, IBM itself has acknowledged that quantum will not replace classical computers but instead form the core of a quantum-centric supercomputing architecture, which means the commercialization path runs through enterprise customers who are still years away from having workloads ready to run on quantum hardware at scale.
Conversely, the ecosystem dependency is also a real risk. Qiskit's developer dominance is impressive today, but if a competing framework gains traction at a critical mass of research institutions, IBM's moat could narrow quickly. Geopolitically, China is also making substantial government-backed investments in quantum computing, creating a state-funded competitive pressure that no private sector roadmap can easily outspend over a decade-long development horizon.
Despite being perceived to be wandering in the wilderness of AI irrelevance, IBM continues to grow its revenue and earnings impressively. Moreover, earnings have surpassed Street expectations consecutively over the past nine quarters, including the latest period.
In the first quarter of 2026 , revenue increased 9% year-over-year (YOY) to $15.9 billion. Software, consulting, and infrastructure revenues climbed 11%, 4%, and 15% YOY, respectively. Non-GAAP gross margins improved to 57.7% from 56.6% in the year-ago period.
Meanwhile, diluted EPS rose 19% YOY to $1.91, ahead of the consensus estimate of $1.81 per share. The increase in earnings also came along with a bump in the dividend. IBM will now pay a quarterly dividend of $1.69 per share. IBM stock currently offers a dividend yield of 2.65%. Having raised its dividend for more than 25 years straight, IBM is considered a “Dividend Aristocrat.”
Net cash from operating activities for Q1 stood at $5.2 billion compared to $4.4 billion in the prior year, as the company closed the quarter with a cash balance of $10.8 billion. This was higher than IBM's short-term debt levels of $8.7 billion.
On the valuation front, IBM stock is also attractively priced. Its forward price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio, price-to-sales (P/S) ratio, and price-to-cash flow (P/CF) ratio of 20.5 times, 3.5 times, and 14.9 times are all below or in-line with the respective sector medians.
Analysts have an overall rating of “Moderate Buy” for IBM stock. The mean target price of $293.45 has already been surpassed by shares, while the Street-high target of $365 suggests potential upside of more than 22% from current levels. Out of 21 analysts covering the stock, 10 have a “Strong Buy” rating, two have a “Moderate Buy” rating, eight have a “Hold” rating, and one analyst has a “Strong Sell” rating.