Quantum landscape

"Quantum" covers three distinct technology families. They share physics and a hype cycle, but they are at very different stages and solve different problems. Being clear about which is which is the first useful thing an advisor can do.

Quantum computing

Discussed in detail on the Quantum computing page. NISQ-era today, with fault-tolerant machines and any broad business advantage still years out. Worth watching and, for some sectors, worth piloting. Worth most organisations' time as a governance and positioning question, not yet a deployment one.

Quantum communication

Quantum key distribution and the longer-term quantum internet. The security value is physical rather than mathematical: it does not depend on an algorithm staying hard to break. Europe is building shared infrastructure through EuroQCI, with Belgian participation via the BeQCI consortium. For most enterprises this is a sovereign and telecom-infrastructure topic today rather than a procurement one, and it complements, rather than replaces, post-quantum cryptography.

Quantum sensing

The most mature of the three: atomic clocks, gravimetry, magnetometry and precision metrology already in real use. It is not where I focus my advisory work, and I would rather say that than pretend otherwise. I cover it here because no honest map of the landscape leaves it out, and because Belgian and EU programmes increasingly treat the three pillars together.

The Belgian and EU context

Belgium has deep university and research-institute strength in quantum, real EuroQCI and BeQCI activity, and a community (Quantum Circle among others) working to turn that into exploration, education and adoption. My role in that picture is specific: the bridge between this technology and the security, governance and board-level decisions that organisations actually have to make.

What this means for your planning

Two clocks run at different speeds. The security clock is regulatory and has dates: the EU expects the post-quantum transition to be underway by the end of 2026, critical infrastructure quantum-safe by 2030, and remaining systems by 2035. The opportunity clock is technological and has no dates, only signals: error rates, logical qubit counts, and the first use cases where quantum beats classical on a problem that matters commercially. Sensible planning treats the first as a compliance programme and the second as a watching brief with an annual review. I help with both.