In 2018, the European Commission launched the Quantum Technologies Flagship, a long-term collaborative initiative for research and development activities related to quantum technologies. The Flagship brings together 236 organizations and over 1500 scientists with the aim of being at the forefront of the second quantum revolution and giving Europe a global competitiveness in an area of great strategic importance. To this end, the Flagship supports the participating private companies, universities and research institutions for a period of ten years with an estimated total budget of 1 billion euros.
In a first start-up phase, 19 research projects, beginning in 2018 and ending in spring 2022, were funded in the fields of quantum fundamental research, quantum communication, quantum computing, quantum simulation, and quantum sensing and metrology. Within this framework, scientists of the Paderborn University were involved in three projects (UniQoRN, PhoG, S2Quip) and thus significantly contributed to the successes of the start-up phase.
These successes are summarized in a recently published report of the European Commission. Among them are, in particular, the first steps towards a quantum internet, the achievement of practical quantum advantage in scientific problems, and significant progress in the development of several alternative computing platforms, including photonic quantum computing. A total of 105 patents filed and 1313 scientific papers published underscore the significance of the initiative. In addition, profitable synergies have emerged during the start-up phase that go beyond the Quantum Technologies Flagship - both at the national and European level.
The progress achieved in the start-up phase will be further refined in subsequent projects in order to bring developed technologies into application. In addition to initiatives from research and industry, measures in knowledge transfer will also contribute to achieving the goal formulated in the "Digital Compass 2030": To bring Europe to the forefront of quantum technologies by 2030.
Details on the UniQoRN, PhoG and S2Quip initiatives can be found on our project pages.
