My Articles, Opinions and Analyses
Science Confirms What Large Corporate Survivors Already Knew – Organizational Bullshit Makes You Worse at Your Job
Regular readers will know that organizational bullshit is a topic I've been fascinated by - and personally scarred by - for years. I wrote about it at length back in 2022, drawing on the foundational academic work by Frankfurt, Spicer, McCarthy, and others, and making the case that we need to systematically free organizations from ...
Inside Quantum Computing’s Modular Revolution – Discussion with QuantWare’s CEO Matt Rijlaarsdam
Quantum computing is entering a new phase where scaling up isn’t just about qubit counts - it’s about how those qubits are built and integrated. A recent discussion with QuantWare’s CEO, Matt Rijlaarsdam, shed light on “quantum open architecture” (QOA) approach that could transform the industry. By focusing on modular design and specialization (instead of ...
China’s Quantum OS Play: Origin Pilot and the Battle for the Integration Layer
China's Origin Pilot isn't just another quantum SDK — it's a top-down systems integration layer that challenges the West's bottom-up approach to quantum open architecture ...
Origin Quantum Computing Technology Co.
Origin Quantum Computing Technology Co. (本源量子计算科技) is China's first and most prominent quantum computing startup, building a vertically integrated superconducting quantum computing platform that spans from chip fabrication through operating system to cloud delivery. Headquartered in Hefei, Anhui Province - the heart of China's "Quantum Avenue" - the company occupies a unique position in the ...
No One Has Secretly Broken RSA-2048 or RSA-4096 — Here’s the Science
If someone tells you RSA-2048 or even RSA-4096 has been secretly cracked, they are either lying to you or have been lied to. There is no third option that is consistent with physics, engineering, the observable behavior of governments and intelligence agencies, the visible state of the global research community, the industrial supply chain for ...
Bitcoin’s Quantum Timeline Is Not RSA’s Quantum Timeline
Most quantum-risk-to-Bitcoin analyses rehash RSA-2048 timelines. They're missing the point. Bitcoin doesn't use RSA. It uses 256-bit ECC - and Shor's algorithm will break that first. Scan the quantum computing coverage of Bitcoin and you will find a remarkable pattern. Article after article cites the same RSA-2048 qubit estimates - 20 million physical qubits (Gidney-Ekerå ...
Q-FUD: The Quantum Panic Industry
Cybersecurity has always had a FUD problem. “FUD” (fear, uncertainty, and doubt) is the oldest trick in enterprise security marketing: paint a worst-case scenario, imply you’re already compromised, sprinkle in enough jargon to make the buyer feel outgunned, and then offer the “only” solution - conveniently available this quarter. Q‑FUD is that same playbook, just ...
Quantum Low-Density Parity-Check (qLDPC) Codes
Quantum Low-Density Parity-Check (qLDPC) codes are an emerging class of quantum error-correcting codes that promise to significantly reduce the overhead required for fault-tolerant quantum computing. Much like their classical LDPC counterparts, qLDPC codes are defined by sparse parity-check constraints: each check (stabilizer) acts on only a small number of qubits, and each qubit participates in ...
Pinnacle Architecture: 100,000 Qubits to Break RSA-2048, but at What Cost?
Iceberg Quantum's Pinnacle Architecture paper claims RSA-2048 can be factored with fewer than 100,000 physical qubits - a genuine 10× reduction over the previous state of the art - by replacing surface codes with quantum LDPC codes. The result is credible but shifts difficulty from qubit count to equally daunting engineering challenges: non-local connectivity, fast ...
Engineering the Quantum Operating System (OS) Stack: From Nanosecond Pulse Control to System-Level Orchestration
The argument for quantum computing's "PC moment" has become surprisingly compelling. QuantWare ships superconducting QPUs to customers in 22 countries. Qblox sells modular control stacks to over 100 labs. Bluefors has installed 1,800 cryogenic systems worldwide. The Quantum Open Architecture movement and reference designs like the Quantum Utility Block are proving that you can assemble ...
Payments and the Race to Quantum Safety / Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQC)
The payments industry has navigated big cryptographic transitions before. The migration from magnetic stripes to EMV chips took the better part of two decades and cost billions. The shift from SHA-1 to SHA-256 certificates was painful but bounded - it mostly meant updating software, not ripping out hardware. The post-quantum transition is different in kind, ...
120,000 Tasks: Why Post‑Quantum (PQC) Migration Is Enormous
When I tell fellow CISOs, board members, or even seasoned program managers that the integrated program plan for a comprehensive quantum security / post-quantum cryptography (PQC) migration I recently worked on contained over 120,000 discrete tasks, the reaction is almost always the same. First, there is a polite silence. Then, the inevitable furrowing of the ...
QuantWare
QuantWare is a Delft, Netherlands-based quantum computing startup that provides superconducting quantum processors as off-the-shelf products. Founded in 2021 as a spin-out from TU Delft’s QuTech institute by Matt Rijlaarsdam and Alessandro Bruno, the company aims to be the “Intel of quantum computing” by supplying affordable, high-quality quantum QPU (quantum processing unit) chips for others ...
China Just Pushed Device-Independent QKD (DI-QKD) to 100 Kilometres
A team at the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) published a paper in Science that quietly redrew the map of what device-independent quantum key distribution (DI-QKD) can do. Led by Bo-Wei Lu, Chao-Wei Yang, Run-Qi Wang, Xiao-Hui Bao, and the ever-present Jian-Wei Pan - the physicist sometimes called China's quantum communications supremo ...
Quantum Open Architecture (QOA): The “PC Moment” of Quantum Computing
Today, a sea change is underway. Quantum Open Architecture (QOA) is doing for quantum computing what the PC revolution did for classical computing - opening up the ecosystem. Just as the computing world shifted from monolithic mainframes to modular PCs with swappable parts, quantum tech is embracing modularity and specialization. Instead of one vendor building ...
Quantum Sovereignty in Practice: When Geopolitics Becomes Architecture
At its core, quantum sovereignty means having full control over the critical layers of quantum technology domestically - the ability to design, manufacture, and operate quantum systems without external dependency. In practice, this implies a country could build a complete full-stack quantum ecosystem entirely within its national borders: from quantum chips and cryogenic hardware to ...
The Cryptographic Iceberg Inside a Mobile Banking Transaction
A single mobile banking payment triggers millions of cryptographic function calls across nine parties. Here's what actually happens - from silicon to settlement - and why it matters for quantum readiness. The Cryptographic Iceberg Inside a Mobile Banking Transaction 320 function calls before you even type an amount It takes roughly half a second. You ...
NIS2, DORA, and the EU Post-Quantum Roadmap
If you are a CISO under NIS2 or DORA, you are already expected to run a risk-management system that tracks material, evolving threats - and to implement “state‑of‑the‑art” controls appropriate to the risk. The EU’s PQC roadmap is effectively saying: quantum is now one of those evolving threats you must govern. The most important conceptual shift ...
The Complete US Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQC) Regulatory Framework in 2026
Three pillars anchor the US PQC framework: the Quantum Computing Cybersecurity Preparedness Act (federal law that no executive order can undo), NSM-10's 2035 migration target (still in force), and NIST's finalized FIPS standards (published August 2024). The Trump administration's June 2025 executive order streamlined, rather than eliminated, PQC obligations, removing prescriptive procurement mandates while retaining ...
The Foundry’s Hidden Supply Chain: Who Really Wins If Silicon Spin Quantum Computing Wins
In September 2025, a team from the Australian startup Diraq and Belgium's imec published a result in Nature that no one in the semiconductor industry could ignore. They had fabricated silicon quantum dot spin qubits on imec's industrial 300-millimeter wafer line - the same kind of manufacturing platform that produces billions of classical processors every ...
No Single Law, No Single Excuse: How Canada Regulates PQC Without Saying “Quantum”
Canada's visible PQC guidance - three documents published mid-2025 - is just the tip. Beneath it sits a layered enforcement framework spanning financial regulation, critical infrastructure law, privacy obligations, and securities disclosure that collectively creates binding pressure for quantum readiness. OSFI already requires federally regulated financial institutions to maintain "strong cryptographic technologies" and has issued ...
Telecom Quantum Readiness: Why the Urgency and Where to Start
An increasing number of telecom leaders have been pinging me lately about quantum readiness. And frankly, that’s exactly what they should be doing. New regulations and mandates are emerging left and right (in various jurisdictions and across the industry) requiring critical infrastructure to become quantum-safe in the coming years. As someone who used to run ...
How the EU Can Capture the Benefits of Quantum Computing
The European Union has entered the global quantum race with determination - aiming not just to excel in research, but to translate breakthroughs into economic and strategic benefits. In July 2025, the European Commission unveiled the Quantum Europe Strategy, a roadmap to make Europe a “quantum industrial powerhouse” by 2030. This strategy acknowledges Europe’s historic ...
The Infrastructure Beneath the Qubit: Four Enabling Technologies That Will Determine Which Quantum Computers Actually Scale
Quantum computing captivates with its physics: superposition, entanglement, interference. The companies that build qubits get the headlines, the funding rounds, and the breathless media coverage. But the companies that build the infrastructure beneath the qubits - the electronics that control them, the refrigerators that cool them, the decoders that correct their errors, the materials that ...
