D-Wave Quantum Moves HQ to CP Group, DRA Boca Raton Campus

A Silicon Valley quantum computing company will move its headquarters to Boca Raton, bolstering Palm Beach County boosters’ drive to turn the area into a hub for tech firms.

D-Wave Quantum, now based in Palo Alto, California, will open its headquarters and a research and development facility by year’s end at the Boca Raton Innovation Campus, according to news releases from the tenant and landlords. D-Wave leased about 25,000 square feet, according to a CP Group spokesperson.

Founded in 1999 and taken public in 2022, D-Wave provides dual-platform quantum computing. Alan Baratz is CEO.

D-Wave signed a $20 million agreement with Florida Atlantic University for the school to purchase an Advantage2 annealing quantum computer, and to have it installed at its Boca Raton campus. After the deal was announced Tuesday, D-Wave’s stock rose 1.6 percent, Investor’s Business Daily reported.

Also on Tuesday, D-Wave announced a collaboration with Davidson Technologies and defense tech firm Anduril Industries to develop quantum applications for U.S. air and missile defense.

Boca Raton-based CP Group and New York-based DRA Advisors own the 1.7 million-square-foot Boca Raton Innovation Campus, or BRiC, at 5000 T-Rex Avenue. The campus was developed in the 1960s by IBM for its research and development.

DRA, led by David Luski, paid $320.2 million for a stake in BRiC in 2021. CP Group is led by Angelo Bianco and Chris Eachus.

The firms recently completed a $100 million capital improvement of the campus.

D-Wave’s move from Silicon Valley to Boca Raton boosts the narrative that South Florida has a growing tech industry supporting real estate leasing. The excitement picked up at the onset of the pandemic when Silicon Valley firms rushed to the tri-county region, which had reopened for business and hosted the 2020 bitcoin conference. At the time, much of the industry excitement was over Miami’s Wynwood, which was a magnet for the techies.

As a whole, data showed the influx of tech companies didn’t translate to hefty office leasing in South Florida. And over the past three years, some of the South Florida firms moved back to Silicon Valley, especially since the area is considered the biggest ecosystem for AI, the latest fad in tech.

But over the past year, there’s been a renewed push to grow the tech industry but in a different South Florida area: Palm Beach County, and especially the city of West Palm Beach. The drive is led by billionaire Steve Ross and other executives at Related Ross, the West Palm-based real estate firm Ross founded in 2024.

At Related Ross’ 23-story 10 City Place building, under construction in downtown West Palm, Fortune 500 cloud computing firm ServiceNow pre-leased 211,900 square feet. It marked last year’s top South Florida office lease. Vanderbilt University is expected to start construction soon for its $520 million West Palm campus that will offer business and tech graduate programs. Ross and other real estate heavyweights played a pivotal role in helping bring the Nashville-based university to West Palm, with Ross committing $50 million in April, hosting fundraisers and advocating publicly for the campus.