As Moore’s law becomes harder and harder to uphold,  Intel Corp. is stepping up its efforts to find an alternative to conventional silicon chips that can keep up with the world’s growing demand for processing power. The latest pit stop in that pursuit is the Netherlands, where it’s investing $50 million into a local institute at the forefront of quantum computing research.

Researchers at The Delft University of Technology, the largest and oldest higher learning establishment in the country, recently made a big stride towards turning theory into practice with the advent of a technique for implementing qubits using a material known as niobium titanium nitride. Its ability to maintain superconductivity in the kind of intense magnetic fields needed to handle quantum state information is a major boon for productization efforts.

That will no doubt be one of the focus points of Intel’s new investment, which will sponsor a 10-year collaboration between researchers at the university and its own semiconductor engineers focused on pushing quantum computers closer to reality. The effort will also see the participation of the Dutch Organisation for Applied Research, a non-profit science institute with some 3,800 employees.

Intel is vague on exactly what the partnership aims to produce, but what’s for certain is that the $50 it’s thrown into the effort is only the tip of the iceberg. After all, as the world’s largest chip maker, the company stands the most to gain – and the most to lose – from quantum computers replacing the silicon processors it’s been selling for the last half a century.

At the same time, however, Intel is not putting all of its eggs in one basket. The chip giant is also exploring alternatives to silicon on the memory front, recently partnering with Micron Technology Inc. to create a technology dubbed 3D XPoint that is up to 1,000 times faster than flash. And others are following suit, with Hewlett-Packard Co. currently working to bring memristor-based systems to market.

Photo via Geralt