Archer Materials (ASX: AXE) made progress across its quantum computing, sensing and medical diagnostics platforms during the March quarter while maintaining a debt-free balance sheet and $10.3 million in cash.
The company advanced technical work toward a demonstrator quantum qubit device, including progress on qubit readout and efforts to scale carbon material growth for wafer-scale device fabrication.
Archer also completed the first phase of its quantum machine learning fraud detection project and is targeting a full prototype by the end of 2026.
Its blood potassium Biochip program reached alpha-prototype stage at clinical standard, creating the basis for beta-prototype development later this year ahead of clinical trials and commercial negotiations.
Qubit Work Moves through Readout Stage
Archer’s 12CQ qubit development program focused on building devices to test and demonstrate qubit readout, a critical function for extracting quantum information from the device.
The work involves building nanometre-sized transistors from Archer’s carbon material and tuning them to operate in a mode where single electrons can be isolated and probed with a magnetic field to determine spin state.
Those single-electron transistors are expected to provide the spin readout method in the final qubit device.
Devices have been fabricated on Archer’s films, nano-onions and graphene, with measurement results feeding back into design, fabrication and material synthesis improvements.
Graphene Partnership and Sensing Work
Archer also moved through the first phase of its collaboration with Emergence Quantum, with both teams mapping graphene across multiple quantum domains and preparing development pathways for future prototype applications.
The second phase of that partnership is intended to demonstrate prototypes in high-impact applications using Archer’s graphene-based technology.
In sensing, the company continued its collaboration with the Swiss Federal Technology Institute of Lausanne, growing carbon film and building test devices for characterisation and measurement.
The program has collected electrical detection of magnetic resonance results on devices, with the aim of achieving room-temperature signatures that could support quantum magnetometers for potential use in medicine, imaging and navigation.
QML Project Targets Fraud Detection
Archer completed the first stage of its quantum machine learning project, which is aimed at improving fraud detection in financial transactions.
The initial phase selected a publicly available dataset containing more than 280,000 bank transaction records—including known fraud cases—to allow comparison between quantum and classical machine learning approaches.
Data reduction techniques have been applied to simplify the dataset while retaining the key features needed for model training, reflecting current limits in quantum hardware and available qubit numbers.
The project has now moved into quantum machine learning simulations and benchmarking, with a full prototype expected by the end of 2026.
Biochip Reaches Alpha-Prototype Milestone
The Biochip program delivered an alpha-prototype for blood potassium monitoring, targeting life-threatening potassium imbalances in patients with kidney disease, cardiovascular disease and diabetes.
The prototype demonstrated potassium measurement accuracy within plus or minus 0.3 millimoles per litre in blood samples, validating the device under Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments requirements for equivalent pathology laboratory testing.
The alpha-prototype combines the Biochip, test cartridge and readout electronics, confirming stable operation across repeated measurements and creating the basis for more realistic testing.
Development work also included microfluidics to move a microlitre-scale blood sample through to the sensing chip, chip packaging onto a printed circuit board and electronics integration to control and read the chip in the cartridge.
Commercial Pathways Remain the Focus
Archer is using the Biochip alpha-prototype work in discussions and project planning with contract manufacturers, with a beta-prototype targeted later this year.
The beta-prototype is intended to support clinical trial initiation and discussions with major MedTech corporations around potential licensing agreements and medical device manufacturing.
The company also expanded Biochip work into feasibility data collection for other species in liquids and market analysis for next-generation medical device sensing applications beyond potassium.
Archer recorded positive net operating cash flow of $139,000 for the quarter and ended March with no debt as it funds research and commercial work across its quantum platform.
