Insider Brief
- Postquant Labs has launched its Quip Virtual Machine (QVM) on the Aglais testnet, providing a shared programming and execution environment for quantum and classical computing systems.
- The QVM supports a constraint-based programming language, a compute-credit pricing model and a verification system for results, while researchers at Monash University, the University of Notre Dame and Purdue University assess the platform.
- In a demonstration at Quantum.Tech World, the QVM ran 1,930 portfolio optimization comparisons in which its quantum solver matched or outperformed the classical solver under the company’s stated evaluation criteria, with both typically returning results in 0.1 to 0.3 seconds.
PRESS RELEASE — Postquant Labs, developer of the quantum computing marketplace quip.network, has launched its Quip Virtual Machine (QVM) and first quantum smart contracts. The QVM is live today on the Aglais testnet at aglais.quip.network and provides a shared programming and execution environment for quantum and classical computing, with support for the leading quantum hardware platforms.
Researchers from Monash University, the University of Notre Dame, and Purdue University are currently assessing the QVM, while SiC Systems is exploring the QVM’s potential to address complex industrial optimization problems, including applications in AI-driven manufacturing and the design, control and operation of chemical and biological processes.
In a live demonstration at Quantum.Tech world, the QVM ran 1,930 head-to-head portfolio optimization races between quantum and classical solvers, using problems created by around 100 visitors. Results within 0.5% of each other were treated as ties. The quantum solver matched or beat the classical solver in every race, and in every race where the results differed by more than 0.5%, the quantum solver produced the better portfolio, by a median of 2.56%. Both solvers typically returned answers in 0.1 to 0.3 seconds.
The QVM is a unified instruction set and runtime for quantum computation, priced in shared compute credits. It exists because the industry has a portability problem: IBM, AWS, and Microsoft do not share a common program representation or pricing model, and writing for each vendor’s stack (Qiskit, Q#, Cirq) amounts to programming in assembly.
Colton Dillion, CEO and Co-Founder of Postquant Labs, said:
“We created the QVM because quantum computing is still fractured between competing instruction sets and assemblers, providing few easy onramps to outsiders. Our virtual machine has three major goals: to unify and clarify pricing of quantum operations and memory across architectures, to distribute hybrid computation across available machines on our network, and to provide an easier abstraction for new quantum programmers that doesn’t require them to think directly in quantum gates or qubit layouts. This initial release brings together annealers, gate-based systems, and classical computers under one constraint-based programming language, and marks our first steps toward a unified representation for all of computing.”
Modeled in spirit after Ethereum’s Virtual Machine, the QVM lets developers write programs in a single constraint-based language covering annealers, gate-based quantum systems, and classical hardware. Programs compile into quantum or classical instructions with predetermined costs, deploy to the Quip Network, and run on connected quantum computers while classical machines benchmark and validate outputs. Developers can publish programs publicly and earn payment each time they run.
Dr. Soheil Mansouri, Co-Founder and Chief Science Officer at SiC Systems, said:
“At SiC Systems, we face a variety of combinatorial optimization problems, and time is of the essence. We want to explore as many solutions as possible in as short a time as possible. This is particularly important in our physics-informed agent architecture to design, control and operate complex chemical and biological manufacturing processes. Quip Network’s QVM can help us meet that requirement and better serve our customers.”
The QVM uses a gas-based cost model for quantum computation. Gas price depends on three factors: qubit space, execution time, and entanglement. Every transaction consists of a baseline cost plus an optional tip, and the maximum possible cost is always known before execution. The goal of this is predictability. Businesses can budget for on-demand quantum workloads the way they budget for cloud compute, without vendor-specific billing surprises.
Existing quantum cloud offerings impose structural barriers: IBM Quantum’s pricing applies only to IBM hardware, and Microsoft’s Azure Quantum typically requires a spend floor of roughly $1,000 before a first circuit can run. The QVM quotes a maximum cost in compute credits before every execution — closer in spirit to AWS Braket’s metered model, but with spot-style pricing quoted upfront per transaction rather than negotiated per provider.
Dr. Terrence Mak, Professor in the Department of Data Science & AI at Monash University
“Oftentimes, when we put a student on a project, it takes them the whole semester just to learn how to program using the latest quantum paradigms. As we evaluate Quip’s virtual machine, we believe it can speed up student training and give them more time to do real research instead of spending cycles learning a specific programming language or how to program quantum circuits.”
Shravan Kumar Sharma, PhD Candidate at the University of Notre Dame, said:
“Working with Quip’s QVM can help researchers and students spend less time learning specific quantum programming tools and more time applying quantum methods to practical research problems, including our work on the Lagrangian operator.”
Dr. Richard Carback, chief technology officer and co-founder of Postquant Labs, said:
“Using a pay-as-you-go “gas-based” cost model is the missing piece that demonstrates quantum computing is commercially viable and practical. When you can predict exactly what a computation will cost before you run it, quantum tests that began as a research experiment become a real tool for engineering because you can quantify exactly how much value it can bring to your products. This is the shift we will be delivering.”
Every computation on the network passes through a three-tier verification system. Quantum outputs are cross-checked against classical simulations; classical providers benchmark results independently; and cryptographic attestations bind each result to the hardware that produced it. Disputes over faulty results are resolved against recorded benchmarks instead of operator self-reporting.
The QVM is live today on the Aglais testnet with free compute credits for new users. On mainnet, computation will be priced in network tokens, with gas costs derived from the factors mentioned above. QuipSwap, which handles end-to-end quantum-resistant payments, launches alongside the QVM as the settlement layer of the ecosystem.