How Canada Can Win the Rapidly Developing Quantum Technology Race

We are on the cusp of a key moment in quantum computing—the point at which modular, distributed, and fault-tolerant quantum computers go from potential to possible. This shift will usher in systems capable of providing universal quantum services for companies and governments around the world. The possible benefits are seemingly endless, from catalyst discovery for new fuels and materials science implications for solar energy capture and battery development to pharmaceutical design for medical advancement.

Naysayers suggest we are still up to 10 years away from commercially relevant quantum computing, but developments in recent months have demonstrated that it is imminent. When this phase of quantum development arrives, we can expect to see the quantum marketplace experience growth, consolidate around a handful of technological and industrial leaders, and, at least initially, see substantial talent shortages globally. 

Despite the longstanding perception that quantum reality is a perpetually distant future, Canada has, for the past 20 years, invested in the fundamentals of quantum computing, science, and technology. An entire generation of computer and quantum scientists exists in Canada because of its foresight in fueling its quantum program. Consequently, Canada has historically been well-positioned to benefit from these transformative technologies. As we quickly approach a quantum commercial reality, it is still within Canada’s power to make the necessary changes now to ensure we will be the home of its winners and capitalize on our local quantum companies’ investments.

Acting before the dominant design emerges entails the risk of betting on the wrong technologies and companies, but the risks of waiting—including dire talent shortages, long adoption times, and limited access—are even greater. Furthermore, early positioning as a leader will set Canada up to be a global exporter of quantum resources and services, providing the country with a robust economic engine for decades to come.

Where Quantum Will Take Us, Where We Are Today

Quantum stands to define the 21st century. Large-scale, accessible, and useful quantum computing will enable humanity to solve problems that today are beyond our capabilities because of the inescapable constraints of classical computing. Canada’s National Quantum Strategy, published in 2022, reads: 

“Emerging quantum innovations will underpin major advances in fields from computing to artificial intelligence (AI) to health care, with a vast range of potential applications: developing life-saving drugs and vaccines, locating critical minerals and other natural resources (and mitigating the environmental impact of extracting them), making transportation safer and more efficient, accelerating the design of higher-capacity batteries, and many more. Quantum technologies will also enhance digital privacy, strengthen cyber-security and safeguard digital infrastructure through secure communications—although in the hands of bad actors, advances in quantum computing could put sensitive information at risk. To remain competitive and expand future opportunities, businesses will need to take advantage of the improved capabilities offered by quantum technologies and help future-proof the economy.”

Quantum computing is not new. The theoretical foundations underpinning it emerged in the 1900s, computers based on quantum systems were proposed in the 1980s, and early quantum algorithms were developed in the 1990s. Yet until recently, the field was confined to test environments of limited available capacity despite innovation across hardware, operating systems, algorithms, applications, and other aspects of quantum computing. 

For the past 20 years, the focus has been on creating quantum bits or qubits, which are the basic unit of quantum information. This earliest phase of quantum computer development was dominated by the production of small numbers of qubits out of a variety of physical phenomena. Known as the NISQ era—for “noisy, intermediate-scale quantum”—the prototypes in this period have relatively small numbers of noisy, unstable qubits. 

There have been impressive breakthroughs in recent months in terms of achieving error correction for the noisy qubits, creating what are known as logical qubits. Logical qubits are stable, and large numbers of them are necessary to run commercially relevant quantum algorithms. The introduction of error correction and logical qubits has brought us to our current state, where the focus is on increasing the number and quality of logical qubits within a single computing module.

The future of quantum computing will focus on generating sufficient logical qubit counts to create a commercially viable, large-scale, distributed, and fault-tolerant quantum computer. Complex quantum computations will require many logical qubits, presenting a requirement for systems to have efficient means of scaling. There will be opportunities to create distributed networks of quantum computers that can perform operations across many modules, much the way that current data centers for classical computers function. This will require large numbers of identical, manufacturable, and high-quality logical qubits with efficient connections between modules. 

Before these technological requirements are satisfied, however, Canada’s government and industry must be positioned for success. Waiting until the commercial availability of distributed, modular quantum supercomputing will be too late. 

A Global Race for Quantum Superiority is Afoot

Quantum technologies are not easy to understand, much less adopt, and the necessary specialized expertise is likely to be unavailable if we wait too long to act. Unprepared companies, industries, and even whole countries will be highly challenged to catch up—even more so, for example, than those entities that decided to wait to see if the internet would really take off instead of preparing themselves to take advantage of its arrival. In many cases, our allies are actively pursuing quantum preparation. 

The Australian government has announced support for the establishment of a quantum enterprise valued at $940 million (US$617 million) to locate a quantum computer and regional headquarters in Brisbane. Half of the funding for the deal is coming from the Queensland government.

The Wall Street Journal, on May 14, 2024, reported, “Colorado and Illinois are both pouring millions of dollars into quantum computing in an effort to position themselves as national leaders in the area and secure coveted federal funding from the $53 billion Chips Act. Calling itself the ‘Mountain West’ hub, Colorado along with New Mexico and Wyoming is seeking $70 million in federal funding under the act to support quantum companies, hardware manufacturing and a talent pipeline… Colorado’s rival is the ‘Bloch Tech Hub,’ a business, academic and government group that includes Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin and is led by the research-focused Chicago Quantum Exchange. Similarly, it too wants to build an innovation-focused quantum lab for startups and also create a multistate community college-based quantum program.”

Aggressive plays such as these by our friends around the world should be a clear sign to Canada that we must act now to seize the opportunity, because the economic benefits of quantum transformation across global industries will not be evenly distributed among regions of the world. The global race is afoot.

How Canada Can Reap the Rewards of Quantum Technology 

We provide recommendations in eight areas where Canada can act today to ensure that we enjoy our share of the benefits in the next phase of development in quantum computing:

1. Talent: Our national tendency is to train talent but then not retain the highly qualified personnel yielded by the investment. Canadian employers must be able to match global professional salaries in the quantum space, which are higher than the Canadian national average and set to rise as available talent grows even more scarce. It is not just scientists and physicists that we will need. Commercialized quantum technologies will require quantum-savvy professionals throughout the industry—hardware/software, C-level executives, finance, legal, marketing, etc. Universities and emerging companies must be supported in training and retaining all the expertise that Canada will need to win the quantum space.

2. Immigration: Canada’s large scale of, and openness to, immigration has been a historical fact, but so has been the slowness of our process. Immigration and acquisition of work visas for qualified individuals should be simplified and streamlined. The fast-track immigration programs of the 1990s that fueled the Ottawa telecom boom were an anomaly, but Canada needs to take a similar approach for quantum. There are numerous examples of quantum researchers who were trained and wanted to stay in Canada but left for other regions because our permanent residency process proved too cumbersome and unwieldy. 

3. Procurement: Major procurement contracts to companies will be necessary on a scale along the lines of the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) funding that fueled space exploration in the wake of the Sputnik launch. Companies in the quantum space have been raising more money in single funding rounds than has been dedicated to Canada’s entire national quantum strategy for over seven years. Without tremendous investment in industry to bring today’s quantum technologies to scale, Canada will be left behind in the period of large-scale development. 

4. Dedicated Due Diligence Teams—Quantum-focused due-diligence teams are already in place in France, Germany, the United Kingdom, and the United States, but there has been no such team established within the Canadian government. Sustained and dedicated attention will be key to driving and maintaining discussions on topics such as procurement contracts in quantum. Canada should employ a full-time team so the government can procure or potentially use necessary tools, lest the entire Canadian quantum industry slips away to jurisdictions procuring from domestic bidders. 

5. Supply-chain investment—Other countries could terminate, obviate, or forcibly consume Canadian efforts by dominating the quantum supply chain if we don’t strengthen the infrastructure to manufacture the chips, computers, and other components that quantum transformation will demand. Cross-platform supply-chain investments from the government will need to be made if we are to retain hope of future digital sovereignty. 

6. Protection against corporate espionage—Comprehensive support throughout Communications Security Establishment (CSE) and Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) processes for all quantum technology companies is required. These need to be integrated with immigration processes. 

7. Policy innovation—Countries around the globe are starting to implement national strategies and export controls to regulate the sale and access to quantum products and services, so Canada will need to craft and enforce its own policies in this area to achieve quantum sovereignty. We must not get “black boxed” out of the quantum transformation. Plus, we need to help firms with the transition to post-quantum encryption. The ubiquitous RSA asymmetric layer of modern public key encryption—used for session key establishment over untrusted channels in online communications, critical infrastructure logins, government and military communications, and more—stands to be supplanted early in the dawning quantum era. This is one of the primary reasons that there must be a sense of urgency around quantum development; we need to make certain that if there are bad actors, Canadian interests are protected.

8. Artificial Intelligence (AI) integration: It is likely that quantum will be the engine that powers AI and that AI will accelerate quantum. Opportunities exist for AI to accelerate quantum algorithm design, for AI to be in the operating systems of quantum computers to optimize instruction execution, and for quantum to accelerate several of the compute requirements from AI model generators.

The Future of Quantum in Canada

Canada invested early and heavily in the promise of quantum, and our national strategy is coherent. Now, the focus must be on delivering—quickly—if we are to enjoy all of its lasting economic benefits. The next explosive phase of quantum development is much closer than conventional wisdom holds, as the pace of innovation globally is clearly intensifying. Aggressive, pointed action must be a Canadian national priority.

We are the country of the Avro Arrow, the CANDU reactor, Nortel, BlackBerry, and Bombardier. We are the home of the first transistor patent, filed in Canada 20 years before the first Bell Lab demonstrations. Indeed, many quantum technologies have already been invented here in Canada, but these are cautionary tales. We must seize the opportunity to reverse our national pattern of inventing transformative technologies but failing to reap their rewards.

For more on quantum development and how Canada can act today to most benefit in the years ahead, please see the remarks of Dr. Stephanie Simmons, Founder and Chief Quantum Officer of Photonic and Co-chair of Canada’s National Quantum Strategy Advisory Board, at the April 1, 2022, meeting of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Industry and Technology. A transcript of the meeting also is available.