QCBRIEF
French quantum computer maker Pasqal will deploy multiple on the ground systems in Saudi Arabia in a joint venture with Eleven Ventures, timed to a state visit.
French quantum hardware maker Pasqal signed a deal on August 24, 2026 to install neutral-atom quantum computers inside Saudi Arabia, rather than rent remote access to machines in France. Neutral-atom systems store their qubits as individual atoms held by laser light, a different design from the superconducting chips used by IBM and Google.
The new entity, Pasqal Arabia, is a JV with Saudi investment platform Eleven Ventures to deploy, commercialize, and scale systems across Saudi Arabia and the wider Middle East and North Africa. It will install multiple on-premises quantum processing units (physical machines sited in-country) alongside classical high-performance computing and AI infrastructure. HRH Prince Abdulaziz Bin Turki Bin Talal chairs the board; Pasqal CEO is Dr. Wasiq Bokhari.
The signing was timed to the State Visit of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to France, where Saudi officials toured Pasqal's HQ and QPU production site. The JV fits inside Saudi Arabia's Vision 2030 push for domestic compute and AI capacity, and follows Pasqal's existing work with Saudi Aramco on simulation workloads.
Pasqal, founded in Paris in 2019, has about 300 employees, 25-plus customers including Saudi Aramco, LG Electronics, Crédit Agricole CIB, and Thales, and more than USD 300 million in private funding. It is also pursuing a Nasdaq listing through a business combination with Bleichroeder Acquisition Corp. II (Nasdaq: BBCQ), a publicly traded shell-company vehicle. The JV's ownership split, capital commitment, and first deployment timeline have not been disclosed; the next concrete watch item is the close of the BBCQ merger and any Pasqal Arabia follow-up.