EuroQCI-Spain
"Developing and Deploying the Quantum Communications Infrastructure."
EuroQCI-Spain is one of the 26 pieces of the continental-wide puzzle that Europe is putting together, known as the European Quantum Communication Infrastructure (EuroQCI), with the sole idea of providing European regions with quantum technologies, enabling a digital sovereignty and industrial competitiveness for the region at a worldwide level, as well as helping to meet European Digital Decade target of being at the cutting edge of quantum capabilities by 2030. EuroQCI Spain is formed by ICFO, UPM, CSIC, Telefonica, Indra, Tecnobit (Grupo Oesia), and Cellnex Telecom.
Team
Valerio Pruneri
Valerio Pruneri is an ICREA Industrial Professor, Corning Inc. Chair, and group leader at ICFO. He currently coordinates the Quantum Flagship project Quantum Secure Networks Partnership (QSNP) and the Spanish initiative related to EuroQCI, focusing on quantum communications. Previously, he worked in industry at Avanex Corporation (formerly Corning OTI) and Pirelli Optical Technologies. With over 50 granted or pending patent families, he has delivered over 100 invited talks at major international conferences in photonics, optical materials, multifunctional surfaces, and quantum technologies. His research has resulted in three spin-offs (www.quside.com, www.sixsenso.com, and www.luxquanta.com) and numerous industrial collaborations. Pruneri's contributions have earned him several awards, including the Philip Morris Prize, the Pirelli Research Fellowship, the IBM Faculty Award, the Paul Ehrenfest Best Paper Award, the Duran Farell Prize, the Corning Inc. Chair and Physics, and the Innovation and Technology RSEF-BBVA Foundation Physics Awards.
Vicente Martín
Vicente Martín is a Full Professor of Computational Science at the Technical University of Madrid (UPM). His primary research focus is on quantum cryptography and its integration into telecommunications infrastructures. Martín has led the construction of several quantum network prototypes in Madrid in collaboration with Telefónica Research, pioneering Software Defined Networking in Quantum Key Distribution. He currently serves as Director of the Center for Computational Simulation and is a founding member of the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) Quantum Industry Specification Group on QKD, where he also holds the position of vice-chairman. Martín has worked in various Standard Developing Organizations, including ITU-T and CEN/CENELEC. He heads the Research Group in Quantum Information and Computation at the UPM and has been involved in numerous projects, including the Quantum Flagship, CiViQ, and OpenQKD. He also co-coordinates the Spanish project on Quantum Communications (Plan Complementario).