Quandela Teams With CEA-Leti to Develop Quantum Photonic Chip

Quandela — a quantum photonics company that is developing a complete optical quantum computer following the release of its photonic computer programming and simulation software earlier this year — partnered with the Electronics and Information Technology Laboratory of the French Atomic Energy Commission (CEA-Leti) to produce a high-performance photonic chip. As part of the partnership agreement, CEA-Leti is making its expertise and manufacturing platform available to Quandela.

The first chips will be available in early 2023.

According to Quandela, its quantum photonics technology has many advantages over other quantum technologies; for example, photons are not sensitive to perturbations in their environment, allowing photonic processors to operate largely at room temperature. In addition, the quality of the single-photon source developed by Quandela makes it possible to remove the theoretical barriers to the development of fault-tolerant quantum computers.

With CEA-Leti, Quandela plans to develop a full-stack quantum computer, in the mid-term, according to company co-founder Niccolo Somaschi, followed by a fault-tolerant quantum computer in the longer term.

In addition to its photonic computer programming and simulation software, Perceval, Quandela offers a cybersecurity enhancement solution with a 2-qubit processor. It plans to make its 6-qubit noisy intermediate-scale quantum computer available in the cloud this fall.