Start-up Quantum Optics Jena (QOJ) receives million-euro investment in Series A investment round

Investors rely on German quantum technology for secure data transmission

The start-up Quantum Optics Jena (QOJ) has taken off and is continuing its success and growth path. In a second financing round (Series A), the company will receive a further 8.5 million euros. Lead investor Join Capital, a leading European venture capital provider, and the initial investors ELAS Technologies GmbH, Fraunhofer Technologie-Transfer Fonds und Beteiligungsmanagement Thüringen (bm|t) and business angel Malte Pollmann are convinced of the groundbreaking future technology made in Germany. With its quantum encryption, QOJ enables tap-proof communication for companies and institutions of all sizes. The fresh capital is intended to drive expansion and make QOJ’s quantum key technology available to the wider market.

Tap-proof communication thanks to quantum optics

“QOJ has the potential to fundamentally change the way we communicate securely.” “We are impressed by the team’s expertise and the performance of the technology,” says Tobias Schirmer, partner at investor Join Capital. When it comes to cyber security, the QOJ team is breaking new ground and is relying on quantum optics. Entangled photon pairs (light quanta) are used to transmit information and data securely. They are used to generate a secret key to encrypt and decrypt data. This method is called entanglement-based key distribution (EKD).

Multiple users can communicate simultaneously and securely using the generated quantum keys. Quantum Optics Jena is the world’s only commercial provider of such multi-party quantum key distribution systems. The company develops hardware, software and services for data exchange and has already received several awards. The solutions are particularly interesting for customers with high security requirements, such as government networks, critical infrastructures and banks that need to communicate confidentially and securely but are exposed to potential hacker attacks. Research institutions, medium-sized businesses and the health sector, as well as society as a whole, can also benefit from them.

Global expansion and development of European quantum communication infrastructure

“Our technology is no longer limited to research laboratories, but ready for use in the real world. “With the new funding, we can expand our production capacities and scale our technology globally,” explains Dr. Kevin Füchsel, CEO of Quantum Optics Jena. “I have been working closely with the experienced founding team of Quantum Optics Jena for years and am deeply impressed by the technology and the progress they have made.” “It is a pleasure for me to be able to support further business development and to see how the company is shaping the future of quantum-secure communication,” says business angel Malte Pollmann.

Quantum Optics Jena is already a global player and is active in Singapore, Spain, Austria and Slovakia. There is a sales dependency in North Carolina in the USA. The company is currently working on networking data centers and critical infrastructures. In rural areas, a communications system is being set up together with partners around the university city of Jena in order to be able to send information and patient data securely to the Jena University Hospital. QOJ is also involved in the development of a European quantum communications infrastructure, EuroQCI for short. It is expected to be operational throughout Europe by 2027.

About the company
Quantum Optics Jena was founded in 2020 from the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Optics and Precision Engineering (IOF) in Jena. The managing directors are Dr. Kevin Füchsel and Dr. Oliver de Vries. A few months after Alain Aspect, John F. Clauser and Anton Zeilinger, whose research made a significant contribution to the understanding of entanglement, received the Nobel Prize in Physics, Quantum Optics Jena brought the first commercial solutions to market. More about Quantum Optics Jena at www.qo-jena.com