“Quantum is the new language to learn”

Abstract

It was the middle of the pandemic when I wrote a special quantum focus article for PhotonicsViews.At that point, my goal was to provide an overview of the technology, the public investment up to that date, how the start-ups landscape was booming all over the world, and the job market forecast.The terms 'education' and 'workforce' were just starting to be two important topics in most quantum conversations.Now, two years later, global investment has increased by almost 10 billion dollars, and start-ups continue to appear and grow worldwide.It is difficult not to find a discussion panel or hear the importance of 'quantum skills and the global quantum workforce' at any quantum event or interview.How to have a pipeline ready to join an emerging workforce goes back to how 'educated' that workforce is.If you are not aware that your skills could be applied in quantum technologies, or even about that emerging market, how can we expect the workforce to be ready?Every year, there are more undergraduate and postgraduate programs on quantum technology being launched all around the world, either from an optics and photonics perspective, or with a focus on quantum computing programming.Either way, the creation of those curricula should be done in parallel with analyzing industry needs.And there comes the next challenge: the specification of those needs.In our role as service providers, we have seen the whole spectrum of industry 'maturity' with respect to quantum technologies.There are the newcomers looking for insights into the field to understand how they could fit in the landscape.Then we have corporations who started to include quantum in their innovation roadmap -some are even working on specific use cases -and are now looking for partners and new opportunities.And finally we can see a few industry actors already having a quantum strategy and team in place.It is a marathon, not a sprint, as a new language takes time to learn.Understanding your role and position in the quantum journey is the first step in learning this new language.You are all invited to join!