Amazon's quantum bet targets $2.7 trillion market by 2035

Amazon is building the infrastructure for quantum computing through its Braket cloud service and Ocelot chip, targeting an industry McKinsey & Co. projects will generate $2.7 trillion in global economic value by 2035.

"In the future, quantum chips built according to the Ocelot architecture could cost as little as one-fifth of current approaches, due to the drastically reduced number of resources required for error correction," Oskar Painter, director of quantum hardware at Amazon Web Services, said in a February company update. "Concretely, we believe this will accelerate our timeline to a practical quantum computer by up to five years."

Amazon Braket, launched in 2019, allows researchers and developers to build and test quantum algorithms in the cloud. The quantum computing industry generated over $1 billion in global revenue in 2025, with McKinsey forecasting $4.4 billion by 2028. Amazon is also developing the Ocelot chip in-house, positioning itself as what analysts describe as a pick-and-shovel provider for the quantum gold rush.

Unlike pure-play quantum companies that must invest heavily in research with no guarantee of commercial breakthrough, Amazon is already profitable — the company generated $62 billion in operating income in 2025. That financial cushion lets it fund quantum initiatives without betting the business on them. The approach mirrors Amazon's broader infrastructure strategy: build the platform others depend on, then capture value as the ecosystem grows.

Amazon's infrastructure-first approach limits downside

Amazon Braket gives the company a role in quantum computing regardless of which hardware technology ultimately wins. The service provides access to quantum hardware from multiple vendors including IonQ, a trapped-ion specialist in which Amazon held a small stake during 2025 before liquidating it by the first quarter of 2026, according to 13F filings. That investment, while modest relative to Amazon's liquidity, signaled the company's interest in strengthening ties within the AWS quantum ecosystem.

The Ocelot chip represents Amazon's bet on its own hardware. Painter said the architecture could reduce error-correction resources by 80 percent compared with current approaches, a critical bottleneck in building useful quantum computers. Error correction currently requires thousands of physical qubits to produce a single logical qubit, driving up cost and complexity. If Ocelot delivers on its promise, it could cut the path to a practical machine by years.

Quantum's long road to commercial returns

The industry faces a fundamental challenge: quantum computers remain years away from solving real-world problems at scale. Current machines are too error-prone for most commercial applications, and no consensus exists on which qubit technology — transmons, trapped ions, or topological qubits — will ultimately scale. The US government recently committed $2 billion in quantum computing investments, including $1 billion to launch Anderon, a quantum foundry backed by IBM, underscoring the strategic importance governments place on the technology.

For investors, the calculus is straightforward. Pure-play quantum stocks offer higher upside but carry existential risk if their specific technology path fails. Amazon, trading as a profitable hyperscaler with $2.4 trillion in market capitalization, offers exposure to quantum's upside without the binary outcome. The company's cloud revenue alone — $108 billion in 2025 — dwarfs the entire quantum industry's projected 2028 revenue of $4.4 billion, meaning quantum does not need to succeed for Amazon to thrive, but if it does, Amazon is already in position.

This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.