One billionaire has made a strikingly optimistic investment, banking on an invention which does not yet exist.

BlackBerry billionaire Mike Lazaridis sees change on the horizon and wants to be the first to reap its rewards.

Lazaridis will dump millions into the development of a technology hub in Canada specifically aimed at advancing the technology of quantum computers – which use the bizarre physics of atoms and sub-atomic particles to conduct calculations.

The billionaire says he believe the ‘Quantum Valley’ will become home a trillion-dollar market.

A number of breakthroughs have advanced the coming age of quantum computers by several years, including a project by an Australian researcher which broke the record for controlling photons for computation.

“There is a quantum revolution coming, an industrial revolution,” Lazaridis says. “It’s audacious.”

The mobile-phone magnate is by no means a newcomer to the game. He set up the Perimeter Institute in 1999 to develop theories, the Institute for Quantum Computing in 2002 to conduct experiments, and now Quantum Valley Investments in 2013 to bring the developments to market.

“This is verging on science fiction and what I’m going to tell you is, even this is probably not crazy enough … In a sense [investing in quantum technologies] was a bet, because you’re betting against the prevailing culture, the prevailing idea, the prevailing attitudes.”

“What you’re looking for is exponential growth,” he said.

“Linear growth is boring. Anything you can predict is linear. What you really want is, you want to think about, well, you want to hope that no matter how wild your thinking is, it’s not wild enough.”