Italy seems to be getting its act together on quantum. At least, that’s the main conclusion one can draw from the news that leading quantum software startup Algorithmiq is to move from Helsinki to Milan, after raising €18 million from Italian investors, in a move which certainly turned heads in the Pathfounders office.
Why so? Well, Italy isn’t exactly the first place one thinks of when the conversation turns to quantum computing. In Europe, that’s normally the preserve of places like the Netherlands, Munich or the London/Cambridge/Oxford triangle.
But, consider this. Founded in 2020, Algorithmiq is not trying to build quantum hardware. It is building the software layer that helps quantum computers become useful for real-world scientific and industrial problems, particularly in chemistry, materials science and life sciences. In 2025, Algorithmiq was the first company in the world to show quantum advantage for a real scientific problem, outperforming Harvard, Oxford, and Stanford. How’s about that?
The funding round was led by United Ventures and CDP Venture Capital, with Inventure VC also participating. The move brings the company’s total funding to €36 million and is being billed as Italy’s largest venture capital round for a quantum startup.
What are the elements that lured Algorithmiq to Italy? For one in founders Sabrina Maniscalco, Guillermo García-Pérez, Matteo Rossi and Boris Sokolov it has a heavy Italian contingent.
Next up, it will be able to hire from excellent Italian universities where the workforce is a fraction of the cost in Finland and other western countries. Thirdly, its main investors are there.
And lastly, last year Italy rolled out a national quantum strategy aimed at boosting research, industrial adoption, and workforce development. Italy’s National Strategy for Quantum Technologies positioned Italy to strengthen its quantum industry.
Thus, the move to Milan is partly strategic and partly political. Algorithmiq will keep major operations in Finland, but Milan will now become its commercial base.
In a post on LinkedIn, CEO Maniscalco said: “Moving our headquarters to Italy is much more than a business decision. It reflects our strategic belief that Europe has a unique opportunity to lead the next phase of the quantum industry, not only through hardware, but through the software, algorithms, and real-world applications that will ultimately determine its impact.”
“Italy has extraordinary scientific depth, creativity, and technical talent. From the legacy of Fermi and Majorana to a new generation of quantum researchers, engineers, and entrepreneurs, Italy has all the ingredients to become a global leader in deeptech and quantum technologies,” she added.
Maniscalco is no slouch. According to Wikipedia since 2014, Maniscalco has been a professor of theoretical physics at the University of Turku and an adjunct professor and member of the Quantum Technology Center of Excellence at Aalto University.
The company already works with major quantum and research players including IBM, Microsoft, Google, AWS, Rigetti, Cleveland Clinic and CERN. In 2025, it claimed to be the first company to demonstrate quantum advantage for a useful scientific problem using its model on IBM quantum hardware.
