PRESS RELEASE — Thales, PASQAL, the Paris Regional Authority and GENCI today announce a multi-year partnership to develop new methods to address planning and scheduling challenges related to the optimization of critical systems through PASQAL’s quantum processor.
Planning and scheduling are key steps for many critical applications such as logistics, air traffic control, industrial automation, resource allocation and disaster recovery assistance to name a few. Computational intricacy and processing times increase exponentially as a problem’s complexity increases. In other words, the scalability of classical systems has been a roadblock in tackling these problems.
Quantum computing can change that. This project aims to demonstrate the scalability potential of a quantum approach to solving these types of problems, which can be directly applied to Thales’ operations. Based on a 100+ qubit platform which provides high connectivity and performance, PASQAL’s quantum processors can efficiently address large scale problems that are simply out of reach of classical computing systems.
The project is supported by the PAck Quantique program (PAQ), an initiative launched in 2020 by the Paris Regional Authority, GENCI and Le Lab Quantique. The initiative aims to accelerate the development of the quantum technologies industry in greater Paris and create synergies between industrial groups and start-ups.
The program is intended to bolster the leadership of Paris and France in the field of quantum computing and improve the competitiveness of French stakeholders in the industry at an international level. The program also aims at highlighting the Parisian hub’s dynamism and attractiveness to encourage new companies to join the ecosystem.
“Thales is fully committed to developing quantum technologies, in particular for quantum sensors and quantum communications, that will provide a real breakthrough for many Thales’ sectors of activity. The partnership with PASQAL, GENCI and the Paris Regional Authority gives us the opportunity to explore yet another important facet of quantum: quantum computing. Of particular importance is that, together we will be able to design and solve optimization problems related to real use cases of high importance for our customers, such as air traffic optimization or space mission scheduling to name a few.” Bernhard Quendt, SVP Group Chief Technical Officer, Thales
“We are thrilled to work on concrete applications with a major technological player such as Thales. The techniques we will develop through this collaboration will be useful for various fields relevant to Thales’ operational activities. Creating value for end-users is a main focus for PASQAL. We continue to develop our technology, both hardware and software, to best answer the needs of our partners and solve any bottlenecks or problems we can for them. We are working hand in hand with our partners: Thales, GENCI and the Paris Regional Authority to build a leading Quantum industry in the area.” Georges-Olivier Reymond, CEO of PASQAL
“Together with Le Lab Quantique, GENCI and the Paris Regional Authority launched the Pack Quantique (PAQ) to enable industries and startups on their journey to growth in the quantum computing industry. AQUAPS represents the joint effort between Thales Research & Technology and PASQAL experts to “quantumize” TRT scheduling use cases. This is the 4th project since the launch of the initiative. Through Paris Region’s funding and GENCI’s free access to the future Pan-European Hybrid HPC/Quantum Infrastructure, this very challenging project will enable both Thales and PASQAL to assess the scalability of the designed algorithm”. Philippe Lavocat, CEO of GENCI and Alexandra Dublanche, Vice-President of the Paris Regional Authority in charge of Economic Recovery and Development, Attractiveness, and Innovation.
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