Table of Contents
This quantum computing market sizing case study follows a growth-equity investor weighing a nine-figure position in a quantum-platform company, and shows how we built a defensible five-year addressable-revenue model by reading public patent signals against published market and funding data – instead of pasting a headline forecast into a deal memo. It is a representative scenario: every hard figure below is a cited public statistic, and every model output is framed as what the method produces, not a disclosed client result.
The Challenge
The investment committee liked the team but could not reconcile two numbers on the same page. McKinsey’s Quantum Technology Monitor 2026 put the long-run economic value of quantum technologies at $1.3 trillion to $2.7 trillion by 2035, while the same report noted the quantum industry had only just crossed $1 billion in total revenue during 2025. A partner asked the obvious question: which of those numbers do we underwrite, and over what horizon?
The deck answered with a single syndicated slide – a trillion-dollar total addressable market with no bridge from today’s revenue to that ceiling, and no link to the company’s actual technology position. That is exactly the kind of top-down figure that collapses in diligence. A 2035 economic-value estimate is not an addressable market a 2026 investment can capture, and treating it as one hides the timing risk that dominates deep-tech returns.
The committee needed the opposite: a bottom-up sizing that separated the durable long-run opportunity from the revenue the company could realistically win over the fund’s five-year horizon, with every layer traceable to a source or a logged assumption.
Our Approach
We ran the engagement as a bottom-up market sizing tied to the IP position, sequenced so each step fed the next:
- Separate economic value from addressable revenue. We split the McKinsey 2035 economic-value range (a whole-economy impact figure) from the served quantum-computing market that vendors actually invoice, so the two numbers stopped being used interchangeably.
- Anchor the near-term ceiling to a served-market forecast. We took the MarketsandMarkets served quantum-computing market – USD 3.52 billion in 2025 rising to USD 20.20 billion by 2030 at a 41.8% CAGR – as the outer boundary for the fund horizon, then stress-tested the CAGR against slower and faster adoption cases.
- Segment by qubit modality from the patent taxonomy. We carved the hardware market into superconducting, trapped-ion, photonic and neutral-atom modalities and mapped filing activity to each, so segment boundaries traced to filed, examiner-recognised technology rather than marketing labels.
- Read the filing curve as a leading indicator. We pulled quantum-technology patent counts and geographic concentration to see where R&D capital was being committed 18-24 months ahead of revenue.
- Cross-check demand with funded deployment. We layered private investment and public programs – venture rounds and national funding – onto the model as independent demand signals, not as revenue.
- Build TAM, SAM and SOM. Each layer carried a citation or an assumption logged for the committee to challenge.
What the Research Found
The evidence reframed the deal. The gap between the $1.3-2.7 trillion 2035 economic value and the roughly $1 billion the industry earned in 2025 is not a contradiction – it is the timing risk, made explicit. McKinsey projects industry revenue reaching $4.4 billion by 2028, and the served market forecast of $20.20 billion by 2030 sits between the two, which let us bound the fund-horizon SAM without borrowing the trillion-dollar slide.
The patent record showed where commitment is real. Quantum-technology patents granted per year have risen roughly fivefold in a decade to more than 2,500 in 2024, a compound growth rate near 17.5%, and over 5,000 quantum-related patents were filed in 2023 – an innovation curve still bending upward. Geographic concentration was the sharper signal: China accounted for around 60% of quantum-technology patents filed in 2024, while the United States, the EPO and the WIPO PCT route remained the primary jurisdictions for the Western-facing portfolios the fund cared about.
Capital flow confirmed the demand curve without being mistaken for it. Total quantum investment reached $12.6 billion in 2025 on McKinsey’s count – a 6.3-fold jump year on year – and more than 300 companies were actively working with quantum vendors. Public money reinforced the floor: the US National Quantum Initiative requested $998 million for quantum information science in FY 2025, part of a multi-year reauthorization framework. At modality level, one segment in the target’s roadmap was filing far faster than its current revenue implied – the white-space signal that mattered most.
The Outcome
The committee replaced the borrowed trillion-dollar slide with a three-layer model it could defend line by line: a TAM tied to the served quantum-computing market on its published growth path, a SAM scoped to the modalities and buyer segments the company actually serves, and a SOM tied to the company’s delivery capacity across the fund’s five-year hold. The 2035 economic-value range stayed in the memo – clearly labelled as long-run optionality, not underwritten revenue.
Because the sizing was wired to the patent position, the investment case became coherent: the modality where the company was filing hardest lined up with the segment the model showed growing fastest, so the technology bet and the market bet pointed the same way. The partner who had asked which number to underwrite got a precise answer – underwrite the SOM, price the 2035 upside as optionality – and the deal moved forward on terms that reflected the timing risk rather than hiding it.
What This Means for Similar Matters
- An economic-value estimate is not an addressable market. A $2.7-trillion 2035 impact figure and a $20 billion served-market forecast answer different questions – conflating them is how deep-tech deals mis-price timing.
- Size the horizon you actually hold. A five-year SOM with a logged assumptions trail beats a trillion-dollar TAM in every committee.
- Patent filing curves lead revenue. Modality-level family counts show where R&D capital is committed 18-24 months before it appears as bookings.
- Investment and public funding are demand signals, not revenue. Count them as evidence the market is forming, never as the market itself.
- When the fastest-filing modality and the fastest-growing segment coincide, the technology bet and the market bet reinforce each other – that alignment is the real underwriting signal.
The Three-Layer Model, Line by Line
The TAM used the served quantum-computing market on its published trajectory – USD 3.52 billion in 2025 to USD 20.20 billion by 2030 at 41.8% – as the outer ceiling, with the services segment carrying the largest share and healthcare and pharma the fastest-growing end market. The SAM narrowed that ceiling to the qubit modalities and enterprise buyers the company can serve today, discounting segments where its roadmap does not yet compete. The SOM applied realistic win rates and delivery capacity across the five-year hold. Each step down from TAM to SOM was a defensible assumption the committee could challenge, not a percentage pulled from the air.
Why Patent Curves Lead Revenue
Filing decisions are made when R&D capital is committed, not when a product ships, so modality-level family counts read as an 18-24 month leading indicator of where a market will move. In quantum, the fivefold rise in annual grants and the concentration of filings in specific modalities told us which architectures had genuine momentum and which were still marketing. Pairing that curve with the served-market forecast let the model flag the segment growing faster than its revenue implied – the same white space the company’s own filings were racing to occupy.
Data Sources
The market and patent data referenced above comes from:
- McKinsey – Quantum Technology Monitor 2026 — Economic value to 2035, 2025 industry revenue, and 2025 investment totals.
- MarketsandMarkets – Quantum Computing Market — Served quantum-computing market: USD 3.52B (2025) to USD 20.20B (2030), 41.8% CAGR.
- National Quantum Initiative (quantum.gov) — US public funding for quantum information science, including the FY 2025 budget supplement.
- QuIC – Global Patent Landscape in Quantum Technologies — Quantum patent filing volumes and geographic concentration across USPTO, EPO and WIPO.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Is this a real client engagement?
No. It is a representative scenario that shows how our quantum computing market sizing method works. Every hard figure is a cited public statistic, and every model output is framed as what the method produces rather than a disclosed client result.
Why anchor quantum computing market sizing to patents?
Patent filings record where R&D capital is committed 18-24 months before revenue appears. Segmenting the market by qubit modality using the patent taxonomy ties every segment boundary to filed, examiner-recognised technology instead of marketing categories, which makes the sizing defensible in diligence.
How is a bottom-up SOM different from a trillion-dollar market figure?
A 2035 economic-value estimate measures whole-economy impact; a served-market forecast measures what vendors invoice. We underwrite a five-year SOM built up from modalities, buyers and win rates, and treat the long-run trillion-dollar range as clearly labelled optionality – not as addressable revenue.
What does the served quantum-computing market actually look like today?
MarketsandMarkets values it at USD 3.52 billion in 2025, rising to USD 20.20 billion by 2030 at a 41.8% CAGR, with services the largest segment. McKinsey separately reports the industry crossed $1 billion in revenue in 2025, heading toward $4.4 billion by 2028.
What public sources underpin the figures here?
Market size from MarketsandMarkets; economic value, revenue and investment from McKinsey’s Quantum Technology Monitor 2026; public funding from the US National Quantum Initiative; and patent volumes and geography from the QuIC global patent landscape drawing on USPTO, EPO and WIPO data.
How often should a quantum market model be refreshed?
At least annually, and sooner around a major funding round, a national-program budget cycle, or a step-change in a qubit modality’s filing rate. Because the model is wired to patent curves and funding data, refreshing those inputs updates the SAM and SOM without rebuilding the framework.