Quandela raises 15 million euros for its optical quantum computer

The French quantum nugget Quandela raises 15 million euros. A fundraising campaign announced on November 16, 2021 and carried out with Omnes, Defense Innovation Fund (Bpifrance) et du Quantonation funds. Its ambition: to make the first complete photonic computer available from 2022 and to allow its access via an online platform.

Prometheus, its unique photon emitter

The start-up was founded in 2017 by Pascale Senellart, research director at the Center for Nanosciences and Nanotechnologies of the CNRS and the University of Paris-Saclay, Valérian Giesz, engineer and doctor in quantum optics, and Niccolo Somaschi, doctor in semiconductor nanotechnologies. The start-up is focusing on the development of a photonic quantum computer. Going in this direction, she unveiled in the course of the year 2020 Prometheus, a single photon emitter.

“What limits the possibility of performing quantum computation with a photonic device are the optical losses – that is to say the lost photons – which mainly take place at the level of the emitter. single photon emission is very efficient “, CEO Valérian Giesz explained on this subject. The start-up uses “quantum dots” or quantum dots. She wants to reach an efficiency threshold of 65%, that is to say that 2 out of 3 photons are well transmitted. A threshold that allows the device to be supplemented with error correction codes.

An optical quantum computer for 2022

“Given recent technological advances in the development of solid-state quantum light emitters, it is time to explore the full potential of this technology for large-scale quantum computing. CTO Niccolo Somaschi Quandela is one of the international leaders in technology, with all the means to boost subsequent developments and integrate the blocks necessary for the construction of computing platforms in a modular fashion “.

From its single photon emitter, Quandela developed “an entanglement system from a chain of single photons contained in an optical fiber loop”. The next step ? “The provision in the cloud of the first full optical quantum computer in 2022”, says Valérian Giesz. The goal is to promote research and facilitate access to this type of computing resources.