Quantum computers that are “practically useful” are 5-to-10 years away, Google Chief Executive Officer Sundar Pichai said, comparing the groundbreaking technology to where artificial intelligence was about a decade ago.

QuEra Computing said on Tuesday the neutral-atom quantum firm has completed a funding round in excess of $230 million, with investment from Google's Quantum AI business unit and SoftBank Vision Fund,

Google claims quantum computing could see real-world applications within five years, sparking debate among experts worldwide.

Startup investors including Alphabet Inc.’s Google and SoftBank Group Corp. are betting that quantum computing, often thought of as a fantastical science experiment, is getting closer to having sweeping real-world applications.

QuEra Computing, a Boston-based quantum computing company, has raised $230 million in a round led by Google (GOOGL) and SoftBank (SFTBF) ’s Vision Fund 2 to develop “fault-tolerant” quantum computers, designed to overcome the computational errors that have long hindered real-world quantum applications.

Governments, led by the US and China, and corporations are pledging billions of dollars to quantum computing research in the pursuit of the futuristic technology

Quantum computing, long relegated to the realm of the theoretical, feels like it is back on the agenda as a potentially viable alternative to the