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Insider Brief
- As quantum technology matures into a commercial industry, companies increasingly require a legal layer to manage financing, acquisitions, public listings, intellectual property and government-backed projects.
- Paul, Weiss, Osler and Cooley accounted for about 65% of the publicly recorded lawyer involvement across nine prominent quantum hardware companies, according to Pirical.
- Quantum-related legal work now spans acquisitions, public listings, patent and securities disputes, financing, joint ventures and government-backed infrastructure projects.
A quantum computer depends on layers of hardware, control systems and software. As the technology moves from the laboratory into the commercial market, a legal layer is forming around it as law firms handle acquisitions, public listings, patent disputes and government-backed projects.
Three law firms account for nearly two-thirds of the publicly recorded legal work involving nine prominent quantum hardware companies, highlighting how a small group of advisers has established an early position as the industry attracts more capital, government support and litigation.
Paul, Weiss , Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt and Cooley accounted for 77 of the 119 lawyer-level involvements identified by Pirical, a London-based legal technology and business-intelligence company that specializes in people analytics for law firms . That represents about 65% of the recorded activity included in the analysis.
The concentration largely reflects the firms’ relationships with three quantum companies. Paul, Weiss has advised IonQ , Osler has worked with Xanadu Quantum Technologies , and Cooley has represented Infleqtion as well as IonQ and Rigetti Computing .
Pirical examined publicly disclosed legal work involving nine companies spanning five major quantum-computing approaches. The companies were Rigetti Computing and IQM Quantum Computers in superconducting systems; IonQ and Quantinuum in trapped-ion computing; Pasqal and Infleqtion in neutral-atom technology; PsiQuantum and Xanadu in photonic computing; and D-Wave Quantum in quantum annealing.
The findings provide another measure of the quantum industry’s commercial development. Legal work surrounding the companies has expanded beyond early-stage financing and patent protection into acquisitions, public listings, securities litigation, international joint ventures and government-backed infrastructure projects.
The analysis also suggests that relationships formed while quantum companies were relatively small could become valuable to law firms if those businesses continue to grow.
Three Firms Establish an Early Lead
Paul, Weiss led Pirical’s ranking with 29 lawyer involvements. Of those, 25 were connected to IonQ and four to D-Wave .
The firm’s position largely reflects IonQ ’s acquisition and financing activity. Pirical identified Paul, Weiss lawyers working across mergers and acquisitions, intellectual property, tax, competition and capital-markets matters involving the quantum company.
IonQ has pursued an expansion strategy that includes agreements to acquire Oxford Ionics and semiconductor manufacturer SkyWater Technology , along with transactions involving Capella Space , Skyloom Global , Vector Atomic and Seed Innovations. Pirical also connected Paul, Weiss to IonQ follow-on stock offerings and the company’s investment in quantum cybersecurity provider ID Quantique .
Osler ranked second with 26 involvements, all connected to Xanadu . Much of that activity came from the Canadian quantum company’s transaction with a special-purpose acquisition company.
Pirical said the Xanadu transaction required a 25-lawyer Osler team working across four Canadian cities and 13 practice areas. The team included lawyers specializing in mergers and acquisitions, tax, real estate, employment, executive compensation, marketing and intellectual-property litigation.
That example illustrates why the number of lawyer involvements is different from the number of individual legal matters. Under Pirical’s methodology, one lawyer working on one matter counts as one involvement. A transaction staffed by nine lawyers therefore produces nine involvements.
Cooley placed third with 22 involvements. Pirical connected 13 to Infleqtion , eight to IonQ and one to Rigetti .
Its Infleqtion work extended from the company’s $100 million Series C financing through its agreement to merge with Churchill Capital Corp X and enter the public market. Cooley’s work for IonQ included defending the company in a securities-fraud case concerning disclosures associated with its earlier special-purpose acquisition company transaction.
The remainder of the recorded work was distributed among 19 firms, none of which had more than six involvements. Davis Polk ranked fourth with six, followed by Orrick with five. Avance Attorneys and White & Case each had four.
Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer , Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman and Simpson Thacher & Bartlett each recorded three involvements. Clifford Chance and Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati each had two, while another 10 firms had one apiece.
Work Expands Beyond Venture Financing
The data collected by Pirical show that quantum legal work is separating into several distinct categories as the industry matures.
Mergers and acquisitions represented the largest category in the data, accounting for 43 lawyer involvements. Capital-markets, venture-financing, tax, intellectual-property and litigation work also appeared prominently.
Patent disputes were among the earliest signs that the field was developing commercial stakes. Pirical pointed to IBM ’s 2020 challenge to patents held by Rigetti as one example. Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman represented Rigetti in the dispute, which IBM ultimately lost.
Securities cases followed the wave of quantum companies entering public markets through mergers with special-purpose acquisition companies, or SPACs. These lawsuits have tested whether companies provided investors with adequate disclosures about their technology, business prospects and transaction processes.
Capital-markets work has also increased. Pirical associated Davis Polk with Quantinuum ’s public listing, Orrick with Pasqal ’s transaction with Bleichroeder Acquisition Corp. II, and Hogan Lovells Cadwalader with an at-the-market stock program for Rigetti . Avance Attorneys advised IQM on its €275 million Series B financing.
Some of the largest assignments no longer resemble conventional technology deals.
Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer advised PsiQuantum on its agreement with the Australian and Queensland governments to develop a large-scale quantum computer facility near Brisbane Airport. The governments announced an A$940 million financial package made up of equity, grants and loans for the project.
Crowell & Moring worked on Quantinuum ’s joint venture with Qatar-based Al Rabban Capital . Announced in 2025, the venture anticipates up to $1 billion in investment from Qatar over 10 years to provide access to quantum technology, develop applications and train workers.
Such projects require lawyers with experience in government agreements, project development, international investment and joint ventures in addition to knowledge of emerging technology.
A Wider but Uneven Pool of Experience
Pirical conducted a second search to identify law-firm partners with publicly documented quantum experience, regardless of whether they had worked for one of the nine hardware companies in the primary analysis.
That search identified 374 partners across 163 firms after Pirical excluded 63 records it categorized as false positives. Those exclusions included lawyers whose profiles referred to academic work in quantum physics or patents involving quantum-dot displays but did not demonstrate experience working with quantum-computing businesses.
Eleven firms employed 113 of the qualifying partners, according to Pirical. No firm outside that group had more than six.
Osler led this broader measure with 16 partners, followed by Paul, Weiss and Wilson Sonsini with 14 each. Jones Day had 13, Freshfields had 11 and Weil had 10. Greenberg Traurig had nine, while Kirkland & Ellis and Barnes & Thornburg each had eight. Cooley and Willkie Farr & Gallagher each had five.
Not all of that experience came from directly representing quantum hardware companies. Some firms developed relevant credentials by advising investors, buyers, property developers or SPAC sponsors on the opposite side of transactions.
Pirical identified eight Kirkland partners connected to the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park in Chicago, where PsiQuantum is the anchor tenant. Weil lawyers advised on the sale of Luminar Semiconductor to Quantum Computing Inc., while Willkie represented the SPAC side of Infleqtion ’s public-market transaction.
Those assignments could give firms experience they can use to compete for future company-side work.
Pirical cautioned that its analysis is based on publicly disclosed matters and information published in law-firm profiles. The totals may therefore favor firms that disclose detailed information about their lawyers and client work. The data, recorded through August 2026, should not be interpreted as a complete accounting of the worldwide quantum legal market or a measure of law-firm revenue.
Even with those limits, the analysis indicates that quantum companies are producing a broader range of legal assignments. The industry’s needs now extend from protecting inventions and raising early capital to completing multibillion-dollar transactions, defending shareholder claims and negotiating projects backed by national governments.