In ion traps, lasers and microwaves put charged particles into precisely defined quantum-mechanical states. These states last longer and are easier to control than is the case with the other qubit approaches.

Comparably speaking, the ion trap approach has already made great progress. At its Villach site, Infineon is working together in particular with the University of Innsbruck, the Innsbruck start-up AQT and ETH Zurich.

Here the focus is on the use of industrial manufacturing methods and scalable architectures to realize highly scaled quantum processors. A particular focus is on developing reliable high-performance quantum CCD implementations (CCD stand for "Charge-Coupled Device") in which shuttling operations move ions between specialized processor zones. Infineon technology demonstrators with sufficient storage capacity for 18 individual ions have already shown for the first time the parallel movement of two ion arrays. They function at temperatures of approximately 10 Kelvin, i.e. around -263 degrees Celsius, and can be realized with comparatively little effort.

You'll find more detailed descriptions on the Infineon ion trap page.