Interview: Dimitri van Esch, Project Manager, ABN Amro

What are you most looking forward to at the Quantum.Tech conference?

I am really looking forward to seeing and hearing the progress that the Quantum world has made and hope to see that a lot of non-quantum companies have opened up to preparing themselves for the Quantum threats we will all face. Even better is to now have the opportunity to discover new possibilities in Quantum technologies. Although it has only been 7 months since Quantum.Tech Boston, a lot has happened and there is so much more to come. We’ve had a lot of questions from other enterprise companies and we’ll continue to help them with their Quantum adoption.

What do you think are the biggest challenges facing the adoption of Quantum technology in 2020?

The biggest challenge is to get the right people to adopt and start thinking about applications for Quantum tech. Awareness and education is key, and inspiration needs to be a result. We should all be aware that adoption of Quantum technologies will not happen overnight, although parts of the core systems will need change, and agreements and standardization for communication channels are mandatory in the mid-long term.

Looking ahead a year from now, how do you see the adoption of Quantum computing progressing?

The second half of 2019 we have seen an enormous increase in publication, pace and investments in Quantum technologies. This pace will slow down a little bit in 2020, but we are convinced the pace should remain high as we need to focus on the creation of our Quantum workforce(s) for Quantum and Quantum related security & cloud suppliers and enterprises. In order to enable this, we need to invest in the education of Quantum employees now. Whether or not we succeed in doing so will be a deciding factor in the pace and progress of Quantum related innovation.

What is going to be the biggest area of focus for your organisation within Quantum over the next 12 months?

We will continue the projects that are currently running. The full cycle demonstration of a QKD system together with Qutech and TNO will mark the finish of the seQure project. At the same time, we invest our efforts in creating awareness of Quantum tech and in attracting the right partners in the form of organisations for the start of larger scale projects. The first initiatives of these partnerships, preferably as part of a newly formed consortium, should start in the beginning of 2021.

Top tips: What is the best single piece of advice you can give to an enterprise looking to start their Quantum journey?

Go from talking and observing to doing! There is no substitution for actual experience. As we have discovered ourselves, only when you are really working on projects you will learn what is required in practice. There are huge opportunities to be had if you start “doing” right now and create your own use cases, business cases and applications.

If you look into the future, what do you consider will be the biggest impact Quantum technology will have on your industry?

The upcoming Quantum threat we refer to as ‘the Quantum Apocalypse’, (the moment Shor’s algorithm is executed on a 4000qubit Quantum computer and breaks an asymmetric key) is considered the biggest threat and will have the biggest impact we can foresee. If you take the impact of Google’s Quantum supremacy publication into account, my question is: What will happen when someone predicts the arrival of the Quantum Apocalypse. In the coming years, an increasing amount of effort and resources will be assigned to preparing for this event.

What technology infrastructure building blocks are required to begin a Quantum computing or secure communications proof of concept?

We will need high quality fibers for QKD, improved QKD sources and sensors. In addition to that we need to make sure we can extend the lifetime of Qubits for Quantum Computing and Communications. In time, the PoC’s will show (the need for) increased ranges and lifetimes for Qubits and photons.

To view when Dimitri is speaking at Quantum.Tech, visit: https://www.quantumtechcongress.co.uk/speakers/dimitri-van-esch