IonQ has closed its $1.8 billion acquisition of semiconductor foundry SkyWater Technology, bringing chip design, fabrication and packaging in-house as it chases fault-tolerant quantum computing by 2028. The deal dilutes existing shareholders by up to 11.7%, and IonQ shares fell 7.68% even as the company posts triple-digit revenue growth.
IonQ finalized its $1.8 billion acquisition of SkyWater Technology on July 31, completing a deal first announced in January. The purchase turns IonQ from a quantum computing specialist into a vertically integrated platform that controls semiconductor design, fabrication and advanced packaging under one roof.
What IonQ paid for SkyWater
SkyWater is a pure-play semiconductor foundry that makes chips for outside customers rather than its own products. It generated approximately $442 million in revenue in 2025, with quantum-related services growing 30% during that period. Under the deal terms, SkyWater shareholders received $15 in cash plus 0.4883 IonQ shares for each share held, working out to roughly $741 million in cash and about 24 million newly issued IonQ shares. Existing IonQ investors face dilution of between 6% and 11.7%. The company's post-deal cash position sits at around $2.0 billion. SkyWater will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary, keeping its name and CEO Thomas Sonderman, and will continue serving its non-IonQ customers alongside IonQ's quantum hardware work.
A roadmap built on in-house fabrication
IonQ expects the acquisition to speed up functional testing of its 200,000-physical-qubit processors, targeting 2028 for that milestone. The company is also aiming for 8,000 logical qubits by the same year, with a longer-term architecture sketched out at 2,000,000 qubits. In-house fabrication is expected to help optimize wafer iteration cycles and co-locate cryogenic testing. Rivals such as Rigetti Computing and Quantinuum still rely on external manufacturing partners for key components.
Growth meets execution risk
The combined entity is targeting approximately $800 million in annual run-rate revenue, built on SkyWater's non-quantum customer base. IonQ's own Q2 2026 revenue came in at $80.05 million, up 287% year-over-year. Yet IonQ shares fell 7.68% to $39.20 as the deal closed.
Sources: The Motley Fool, Crypto Briefing
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