It's perfectly reasonable for a large organization like some part of the USG or Google or IBM to simply buy one to see what it's like. If there actually is a there there (perhaps even one not known to the developers) they can learn something. And if there's something real (even if not useful) they can gain a leg up on users of the next generation system, perhaps from a different company who actually does know what they're doing.

And if it is a flop, well, the marginal cost is pretty minor. When I was at MIT we bought all sorts of crazy things some of which turned out to be useful in unexpected ways once you actually had the equipment in your hands.

A good example of this was the EmDrive which really seemed like a scam to me but might have a there there. I wouldn't have believed it at all except that NASA, a seemingly independent organization where this is concerned, saw enough that it's apparently worth looking further. If it had been the 100% scam I assumed (and that's still not clear) I'd still be OK with the money spent.

At the moment I still don't believe D-Wave and dinnertime discussions with friends at Google have not caused me to change my opinion.