Investment: First German quantum cloud for industrial providers

The Munich startup Qmware is to supply the hardware and software. Also: Crypto exchange Binance acquires competitor FTX and Twitter could become chargeable.

Good morning! While you slept, work continued elsewhere in the digital scene.

The top topics:

So far, there are no operational quantum computers. The Federal Ministry of Economics has now initiated a project for industry with which German companies will soon be able to use this technology. As the “Handelsblatt” reports, a consortium was commissioned to set up the first German quantum cloud for industrial users. They are involved in it University of Stuttgartthe Fraunhofer institute focus and the Munich startup Qmware. The startup is to supply the hardware and software for the project. The cloud specialist is in charge of the project Ionica subsidiary of the telecommunications group United Internet. The federal government is funding the three-year project with a low to mid double-digit million amount.

In the future, quantum computers will be able to perform tasks that today’s supercomputers cannot. With the new cloud, a platform for quantum applications is being developed specifically for German industry, it said. In addition, Germany is positioned as a pioneer. So far, large US providers such as IBM or Alphabet the development of technology. [Mehr bei Handelsblatt]

On the founding scene: Grass is grown in Saxony – quite legally. What’s more, the customer is the federal government. Soon the cannabis startup could Demecan already growing grass for semi-luxury foods near Dresden. Our editor Nadine Jantz took a look around on site. [Mehr bei Gründerszene]

And here are the other headlines of the night:

Binancethe world’s largest crypto exchange, is acquiring competitor’s operations FTX outside the USA. “This afternoon, FTX asked for our help,” tweeted Changpeng Zhang, Binance CEO. “There is a significant liquidity crisis. To protect users, we have signed a non-binding letter of intent in which we intend to fully acquire FTX.com and help address the liquidity crisis.” He added that the deal is non-binding and subject to review. According to a memo reported by Reuters, customers had withdrawn $6 billion from FTX in just 72 hours. [Mehr bei Bloomberg, CNBC, The Information, Reuters und Wall Street Journal]

TwitterCEO Elon Musk is considering making the use of the short message service generally chargeable. One concept is to offer Twitter free of charge for a limited time and then demand money. So far, the tech billionaire had announced that it would offer all users who take out a subscription for eight US dollars a month the verification ticks highlighted in blue as a bonus. [Mehr bei Handelsblatt und CNBC]

quarterly results: Disney released its results for the fourth fiscal quarter for the period ended October 1st. The direct-to-consumer segment, which includes Disney+ and other streaming services, lost $1.47 billion in the quarter, more than double the year-ago figure. Disney reported that Disney+ increased its total subscriber count to just over 164 million in the quarter, up from around 152 million at the start of July. The sales and profits of Lucid fell short of analyst estimates in the third quarter. The luxury electric vehicle maker’s revenue was $195.5 million. The Lucid shares responded with a price loss of 13 percent. Tripadvisor has reported weak quarterly profit and announced a slowdown in current-quarter revenue. [Mehr bei The Information, Bloomberg und Reuters]

redundancies: Salesforce has laid off almost 1,000 employees, according to an insider. At the end of January, the software group based in San Francisco employed a good 73,000 people. Nowone of the oldest channel partners of Google Cloud, is laying off 11 percent of its workforce after missing its “overly optimistic” second-half growth forecasts. The Los Angeles-based company hit 500 employees last October and plans to hire 200 to 300 more people this year. Meta plans, as previously reported, to lay off employees today. Affected employees will be notified via email. [Mehr bei CNBC, The Information und The Information]

A U.S. federal judge granted the motion Theranos-Founder Elizabeth Holmes rejected on a new procedure. The 38-year-old, who had promised revolutionary blood-testing technology, was found guilty on four of the 11 charges in January. Holmes faces a year in prison. [Mehr bei Techcrunch und CNBC]

Our reading tip on Gründerszene: The German-speaking editors of Forbes compiles its own list of up-and-coming talent every year. Among them are 13 German founding teams. [Mehr bei Gründerszene]

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Happy Wednesday!

Your Gründerszene editors