The Unitary Fund’s microgrant program recently marked an incredible milestone: over 100 microgrants awarded! This achievement highlights the program’s pivotal role in advancing open source quantum technology projects globally. Through grants and open-source ecosystem development, Unitary Fund fosters a flourishing, multiplying effect within the broader quantum ecosystem. These small but impactful investments drive accessible and transparent progress, essential for unlocking the full potential of quantum technology.

Thank you to our sponsors for making these microgrants possible! Core Members: IBM Quantum, DoraHacks, OQD, and Scientifica; Supporting Members: AWS, Microsoft, Pasqal, QC Ware, IonQ and SandboxAQ.

To commemorate this event, we spoke with our current and former grant recipients to gauge the impact and reach of their supported projects. Here’s what we found.

This impressive impact was obtained for less than the cost for a U.S. university to provide two fully funded PhD studentships from enrollment to graduation.

Impact to the Community: Growing the Ecosystem

The survey highlighted significant contributions to the broader quantum technology community. Many projects have inspired collaborations and integrations with other tools and platforms. Shinichi Sunami’s graphix project, for example, has integrated with Perceval, fostering interoperability and expanding its utility. Xiuzhe (Roger) Luo’s grant project Yao.jl was the start of QuEra’s software development kit Bloqade. The pyZX project by Aleks Kissinger and John van de Wetering led to additional projects QuiZX, a speedy rust port of pyzx, and Quantomatic zxlive, a GUI frontend.

With over 400+ contributors across projects, Unitary Fund microgrants are useful spaces to grow our open source tooling. They represent a vibrant community of individuals contributing code to open source tools and citing microgrant work in papers over the last 6 years, creating more than 40 different libraries.

Projects such as QWorld, Iteration One, and <Quantum|Chamitas> have facilitated educational opportunities and professional networking, reaching thousands of unique individuals globally. The microgrants have also led to the creation of 3 separate startups and 1 non-profit.

Notably, there are more than 420 papers that cite research coming directly from Unitary Fund’s microgrants, supporting thousands of researchers globally in their own research and papers, providing a significant contribution to the quantum ecosystem. Some notable papers include the PyZX whitepaper (a compiler that maps quantum circuits to graphs using ZX calculus) or the QuNetSim simulator white paper (a quantum internet simulator built on top of QuTiP).

Impact to the People: Beyond the Project

The microgrant recipients reported substantial personal and professional growth as a direct benefit of the program. Here are some key takeaways: 87% of microgrants resulted in additional resources to the micrograntee, including additional financial funding, hardware access, new collaborators or contributors, or new professional networks.

87% of microgrants resulted in career advancements, from academia, industry, or helping them to pivot their careers. 51%+ of microgrants have gone to individuals belonging to a historically underrepresented group in STEM, highlighting the program’s commitment to diversity and inclusion in the quantum computing field.

Hear the impact from Microgrant recipients

“You are one of the best things that happened to quantum software. Please continue the no nonsense approach.” - Fred Jendrzejewski

“I would like to express my sincere gratitude to UF for their invaluable support. I truly appreciative of UF’s commitment to fostering innovation and collaboration in the field of quantum computing.” - Dafne Carolina Arias Perdomo

“I am so thankful for this opportunity and truly appreciate your commitment to open quantum science!” - Mattias Fitzpatrick

“The visibility at unitaryhack prompted a discussion and then a collaboration with INRIA-Paris team and U of Edinburgh team working on blind quantum computing.” - Shinichi Sunami

“As a young student from a low income country I had no means to work on academic projects since they were always unpaid. But with the help of Unitary Fund’s grant during COVID, I was able to work on my first proper theoretical project. This project was the first step towards building my foundations in theoretical research and I believe I wouldn’t have worked on any other research projects without it.” - Muhammad Usman Farooq

Looking Forward

As we celebrate this milestone, the Unitary Fund remains committed to supporting innovative quantum computing projects. The feedback from our grant recipients will guide future iterations of the program, ensuring that we continue to foster innovation, collaboration, and growth in the quantum computing space.

The success of these projects is a testament to the creativity, dedication, and hard work of the quantum computing community. We look forward to the next 100 microgrants!

Join Us: Whether you’re a researcher, developer, or enthusiast, get involved with the Unitary Fund’s initiatives and be part of the growing ecosystem. Together, we can achieve more!

Apply here for a microgrant and make sure to follow our Discord, X, LinkedIn, and our Community Calendar for all the latest updates!