Tech Mahindra’s R&D arm sets up centers of excellence in quantum computing in Finland, India

Tech Mahindra's research and development (R&D) arm, Makers Lab, has set up a quantum center of excellence (CoE), called QNxT, in Helsinki, Finland to tap into the country’s expertise in quantum computing and speed up commercial use of quantum computers globally.  

Makers Lab will also set up quantum centers at home, in Pune and Hyderabad, to explore the application in different sectors, like telecom, 5G, energy, and healthcare. The company said that it will start the process by putting together a team of over 200 quantum machine learning experts and five research fellows.

“Our QNxT CoEs will solidify our research and design capabilities. It will also help us implement business use cases effectively to solve complex customer challenges by leveraging quantum computing,” Jagdish Mitra, chief strategy officer and head of growth at Tech Mahindra, said in a statement.

The move comes a day after delegates from India and Finland met to discuss possible areas of cooperation in quantum computing research and development. “The two countries are trying to get academic and industrial partners, which can help develop quantum science and technology for the betterment of humankind in particular and the planet in general,” said S. Chandrashekhar, Secretary, Department of Science and Technology (DST), yesterday.

India and Finland also signed a joint declaration for setting up the Indo-Finnish Virtual Network Centre on Quantum Computing on April 19.

The primary objective of the QNxT center is to enable training, education, testing, and R&D in quantum computing. However, it will also focus on identifying problem statements for quantum computing and develop use cases like “fraud identification and folio optimization in finance, drug discovery and precision medicine therapies in healthcare, and 5G bandwidth optimization in telecom.”

Mika Lintila, minister of economic affairs of Finland, welcomed Makers Lab to build connections with businesses and innovators in Finland. He said, “Finland is one of the leading countries in quantum computing in Europe. I see great value in further developing our ecosystem in partnership with strong international players such as Tech Mahindra.”