Nvidia (NVDA) CEO Jensen Huang seems to do no wrong. Yet, he had to eat humble pie on this one. After stating that “very useful quantum computers” may still be 15 to 30 years away in January, Huang held the company’s first-ever quantum day just a couple of months later, sounding ever-so-bullish about it.
And not just Nvidia, tech titans such as Microsoft (MSFT), Alphabet (GOOG) (GOOGL), and Amazon (AMZN), along with pure-play quantum computing names such as D-Wave (QBTS), Rigetti Computing (RGTI) and IonQ (IONQ) are making a beeline to gain a head start in the quantum computing race, widely touted to be the next battleground for big tech after artificial intelligence (AI).
But where does Honeywell (HON) fit into all this?
Founded as Honeywell Heating Specialty Company in 1906, Honeywell is a diversified technology and manufacturing conglomerate with four primary business segments. These are aerospace, Honeywell Building Technologies, Performance Material and Technologies, and Safety and Productivity Solutions.
Valued at a market cap of $141.5 billion, HON stock is down 2.1% on a year-to-date (YTD) basis, with the stock offering a dividend yield of 2.03%. This was higher than the sector average of 1.68%.
However, to answer the aforementioned question, Honeywell’s trump card to make space for itself in the quantum computing industry lies with its subsidiary, Quantinuum.
Born in 2021 from the merger of Honeywell Quantum Solutions and Cambridge Quantum Computing, Quantinuum designs and delivers advanced trapped-ion quantum computers and middleware, software, and applications across industries like cybersecurity, chemistry, finance, and AI. Headquartered in Cambridge, UK, with a U.S. base in Broomfield, Colorado, it now employs 450–550 staff, including over 300 scientists and engineers.
Quantinuum’s leadership includes CEO Rajeeb Hazra, formerly at Intel (INTC) and Micron (MU), and Chief Product Officer Ilyas Khan, founder of Cambridge Quantum.
After raising $300 million at a $5 billion valuation, headlined by J.P. Morgan (JPM) in February 2024, the company is now seeking to raise fresh capital at a proposed valuation of $10 billion, with Nvidia being tapped to become the marquee investor this time.