Industry Committee on March 25th, 2022

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

You are entirely correct.

In view of the espionage committed by hostile countries, which may even have taken place at the Canadian Space Agency, are we putting sufficient measures in place to protect ourselves?

I would like to get a brief answer.

[Dr. Nipun Vats]

Very quickly, for both the academic sector and Canadian industry, there's been a lot of effort over the last couple of years to do a lot of outreach and training. For researchers, it's even like, “What could someone want to steal that I have?” It's about whether you have the right protections in terms of cybersecurity.

So there's cybersecurity work, and it's the same thing with companies. Organizations and security agencies are going to companies directly to make sure they are providing them with training and advice to ensure that they have the right kinds of protections in place and to make sure they're minimizing the risks of exfiltration of Canadian innovation. It's a very active area for the federal government right now from both a research and industry perspective.

I think Geneviève has something she wants to add.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Vats.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joël Lightbound]

I'm sorry, Madame Tanguay. I'll have to stop it there if we want to go to our last questioner.

Mr. Masse, you have two and a half minutes.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'll let Madame Tanguay go ahead. Monsieur Lemire was actually heading in the direction on cybersecurity that I was going too. I'll let her get her response in.

[Dr. Geneviève Tanguay]

Thank you.

I can tell you that the level of security at the NRC is very high. All employees have to pass a security check. We are pretty strict about this. We have the same requirement for visitors and the companies we work with, because we want to be sure that if we transfer something, it is not going directly to another country. Measures are increasingly being taken by research organizations to guarantee the security of the research being done here.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Is there work being done as well with regard to training Canadians, that you know of? I know that Coding for Veterans is a program to go through with regard to getting Canadians into the cybersecurity forum. Is that happening as part of this too?

As we're investing more into this, it's going to be a real challenge. It's also a real opportunity. Coding for Veterans has been very, very successful at this. I'm wondering if you have any thoughts on how we continue to train on the practical job elements that are necessary beyond research and development.

[Dr. Nipun Vats]

Thanks for the question. Briefly, when it comes to cybersecurity, and quantum is part of that, there was a program launched last year, called the cybersecurity innovation network, that is basically to fund collaborations between universities and industry as well as training programs across the country. Colleges, to some extent, are involved in that as well, I believe. It's to make sure that the research that's being done at universities and the training that's being done at universities actually target the needs of Canadian industry when it comes to cybersecurity.

That's a complement. That's more focused on cybersecurity specifically, but that's a complement to what we're doing here through the strategy. Cybersecurity and quantum are quite strongly linked in some ways. That is an important piece of the puzzle.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joël Lightbound]

Thank you, Mr. Vats and Ms. Tanguay. That is all the time we have with you. I want to thank you for being here today and starting off the committee's study on quantum computing. Take care of yourselves.

I am going to briefly suspend the meeting to give the witnesses in the second group time to join us.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joël Lightbound]

The meeting is resumed.

I would like to thank the witnesses in the second group for being here with us.

The witnesses for this second hour are: Alexandre Blais, Professor and Scientific Director of the Quantum Institute at the Université de Sherbrooke; Norbert Lütkenhaus, Executive Director of the Institute for Quantum Computing at the University of Waterloo; and Barry C. Sanders, Professor and Scientific Director of the Institute for Quantum Science and Technology at the University of Calgary.

Thank you all for being here with us on this Friday afternoon.

We will start with you, Mr. Blais. You have the floor for six minutes.

[Dr. Alexandre Blais, Professor and Scientific Director, Quantum Institute, Université de Sherbrooke, As an Individual]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

First, I would like to thank you for giving me the opportunity to talk to you today.

As the Chair has just said, I am the Scientific Director of the Quantum Institute at the Université de Sherbrooke. My research deals with the development of quantum computers, and has led to the creation of four young quantum enterprises led by students.

Despite the ever-increasing power of modern computers, there are some computations of scientific, societal and economic value that are simply impossible to realize. Quantum computers promise to make some of these impossible computations possible. A quantum computer could indeed efficiently complete computations that would take billions of years with today's fastest supercomputers. For some problems, the speed-up offered by quantum computers is more modest. For others, there is no speed-up at all.

Understanding the real-world quantum acceleration that can be expected from future quantum computers remains an open question. We don't know everything yet, and answering this question is made more difficult by the fact that we don't have fully functional quantum computers.

However, fundamental research and technological development towards the realization of these computers is accelerating at a phenomenal pace. In the last few years only, we have already gone from very rudimentary devices to small quantum computers on the cloud. These devices can be used to test new ideas and to develop new applications. The price of entry to contribute to the field is no longer a Ph.D. in physics.

Although the current generation of quantum computers is still too simple to run large-scale computations, quantum advantage has already been demonstrated. In other words, the current generation of quantum computers can compete for some specific tasks with today's most powerful supercomputers.

How long will it be before fully functional quantum computers become available? As already mentioned, fundamental research and technological development are still needed, and it will take time. This is to be expected. Going from transistors to our modern computers took decades.

Because its researchers are responsible for many key discoveries, Canada has a long history of excellence in the field and a solid reputation internationally. This has been made possible thanks to investments from NSERC, CFI, CFREF, CIFAR and others. This has led to a critical mass of researchers with extensive expertise and state-of-the-art research infrastructure. In particular, the CFREF funding in Sherbrooke, Waterloo and UBC gave us the resources, agility and long-term perspective needed to be competitive and has helped grow Canada's presence internationally.

Looking back, one can almost say that Canada's position in quantum research was reached by luck. It is the efforts of individual researchers and institutions using existing competitive programs. At a time when other nations are investing strategically in quantum, for Canada to follow the same approach can only lead to one thing: a smaller role for its researchers and industry on the global stage.

Of course, this is where the national quantum strategy enters and why it is excellent news. To ensure maximum impact of the strategy, there are, in my opinion, a few aspects to consider.

First it is important to acknowledge that, while it is an excellent effort, it is relatively modest compared to other nations'. I'm convinced that it can have a large impact, but it remains important to manage expectations.

Second, I mentioned that Canada's position in quantum was achieved by individual researchers and institutions using existing competitive programs. Of course, the national strategy is only now being deployed, but up until now, the investment appears to follow the same approach of relying on existing programs. There is a danger in this approach. We have limited resources and cannot excel in everything quantum. Choices will have to be made.

Fortunately, quantum science and technology are more than one idea. It is not a winner-takes-all situation. Making choices may mean that we will lose some opportunities, but not that we will lose the race. It's quite the contrary.

What are some of the important actions to take to maximize the national quantum strategy's impact? First, over technology, talent is the real quantum advantage. It is important to attract and train talent at all levels: faculty, postdocs, graduate students and technical staff. Not everybody needs a Ph.D.

At the moment, Canada's biggest export in quantum is probably talent. It is crucial to retain in Canada those who we train. At institut quantique in Sherbrooke this has been on our mind since day one after receiving the CFREF award. We have taken action for our graduate students and postdocs to receive the appropriate training and support to become young entrepreneurs and to create their own quantum startups.

The culmination of this vision was the creation only a few weeks ago by the provincial government of a quantum innovation hub in Sherbrooke with over $450 million in public and private investments. This will continue to grow the quantum ecosystem in Sherbrooke and more generally in Canada. It will help us to retain our talent here but also to become even more attractive internationally for students, companies, and investors. More initiatives like this are needed as well as support for existing initiatives.

Building on existing centres of excellence is also, more generally, an important way for Canada to remain competitive on the global stage. Over the last seven years, the CFREF quantum centres have built unique research capacity, something from which the old Canadian quantum ecosystem has benefited. Continued support for these centres of excellence will help Canada maintain its leadership.

In summary, fundamental research and technological development are needed before quantum computers are available. The timeline isn't certain. The potential is vast, but expectations need to be managed.

To have impact on the global stage, Canada needs a national quantum strategy that is ambitious, agile and makes strategic choices. This is how Canada can remain at the forefront of quantum science and technology, helping drive our country's long-term economic and social prosperity.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joël Lightbound]

Thank you, Mr. Blais.

I'll now yield the floor to Mr. Lütkenhaus.

[Dr. Norbert Lütkenhaus, Executive Director, Institute for Quantum Computing, University of Waterloo, As an Individual]

Thank you very much.

Good afternoon. My name is Norbert Lütkenhaus. I'm the executive director of the Institute for Quantum Computing.

I have been working in the field of quantum information since 1993. More specifically, I work in the field of quantum cryptography.

First, let me say a few words about what quantum information is. Alexandre Blais already gave something of the introduction. Of course, the main ingredient is quantum physics, which talks about how the world works on a microscopic scale. Actually, we had the first quantum revolution by understanding these rules and that gave us devices like lasers and transistors, which of course led to computers and so on. These technologies are actually driving today's high-tech industry and you of course know them from your everyday life.

The second quantum revolution is now merging quantum physics with computer science and information theory. The difference is that now we ask questions about whole systems and not just devices.

What are these questions? They are, for example, about how to compute the answer for a mathematical question. It might sometimes sound very abstract, like how can we factor large numbers? We actually found that we have to change our view of what is a hard problem and what is an easy problem. We know some problems that quantum computers can solve efficiently that conventional computers cannot.

Another example for quantum information is actually that we ask questions like, how can we securely communicate over a channel so that an eavesdropper cannot listen to our communications? How can we actually secure our privacy over here? Here again, quantum information gives us the tools at hand to protect this privacy.

This second quantum revolution is asking for systems. The knowledge about these systems and the knowledge of how to build them is what will drive tomorrow's high-tech industry.

Now it is important for me to say something about the time scale. In the end, quantum information is a long-term game, but it has short- and medium-term benefits and even benefits today.

Why is it a long-term game? First, we know quantum computers solve particular tasks like breaking codes or simulating quantum systems. They are really good at that one.

What else can they do? That is really a question for basic research. We really have to find these applications where a quantum computer can help. Any problems that are computationally intensive for conventional computers, maybe because you run out of computational power, is of course fair game to us. We need fundamental research. We need to understand what the advantage would be.

The second thing is, of course, the need to build quantum computers that actually scale up and that we can build into large computers. This is a hard problem, but as Dr. Blais already said, we are making progress. This is therefore a long-term game.

We have made advances as well in the medium term. As we make progress toward building scalable universal quantum computers that can solve all these wonderful things, we are finding out two things. One is that the hardware that they're building is getting better and coming toward the universal quantum computer.

At the same time, as we investigate which problems can be solved by a quantum computer, we realize there are more problems that need smaller quantum computers to actually work and have a crossover. The interesting question is, where does this crossover happen and what will the problems be? That is a field where academia and industry are working today because there will be an extremely high payoff when they find the first crossover problems.

In the short term, quantum communication is actually ready for action. These are things we can build and develop. The quantum-secured communication and the QEYSSat mission by the CSA, which is led out of IQC, are examples of this near-term development.

Now with other things, we have even shorter time scales. These are things that we can do today. That is something to do with the difficulty of building quantum computers. Quantum computers are difficult because just environmental noise can disturb them easily, so we really need to learn how to harness and control it. The interesting thing is if we have a device that is very susceptible to the environment, we then take it, turn it around and use this device as a sensor to measure small variations in electrical gravitation fields. That is the field of quantum sensors, which is something that we already see happening today.

If you think about the benefits for Canada of working in that field, of course it's important for the quantum industry. We know of course that the quantum industry is involved not only in the short term, but also already in the medium- and long-term activity today. It's very important to realize that one. There is a forecast from the Doyletech study that predicts an $8.2-billion year-end turnover and 18,000 highly skilled jobs by 2030.

If you think about that, it means that we need to build the workforce. IQC has been doing that for more than 20 years on all kinds of levels. At the moment, for example, we're training 200 graduate students who are working at Waterloo at the moment, and our graduates are easily taken up by the emerging quantum industry. Our colleagues in Sherbrooke and Calgary are building up these programs as well, so this will be something we do jointly.

The second point is very important. We need to maintain this research continuum. Lots of our focus is based on basic research, and we have this funnel of work built on that. It is really important. Although we look at the short term, for things like quantum centres, they come because we have the bigger effort. Always remember, if you like cherries, you need to plant a cherry tree. You can't grow the cherries directly. There is a whole system that you need.

The third part is asking how we structure it. Shared resources are very useful. In Waterloo, we have the Quantum-Nano Fabrication and Characterization Facility, which helps the incoming quantum industry to lower the initial investment threshold. It becomes a gain, it helps the academic research community and we have these networks and collaborations all over Canada to use it.

Together, the availability of talent, academic excellence and shared resources attract investment for the quantum industry. It may be local start-up companies—we have 14 spin-offs from IQC alone—or faculty interns, post-docs and students, as well as other companies coming from outside.

It will be a pleasure to elaborate more on those points when you have questions about them. I am available for meetings either online or one-to-one in person, once I'm in Ottawa.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joël Lightbound]

Thank you for your testimony.

I now turn the floor over to Mr. Sanders.

[Dr. Barry C. Sanders, Professor and Scientific Director, Institute for Quantum Science and Technology, University of Calgary, As an Individual]

Thank you very much.

I'm very lucky to go third, because my good friends Alexandre and Norbert did great pitches on quantum and why it's important.

Before I go into my spiel, I'll just mention that we're a close-knit community. I've written papers with both Alexandre and Norbert. I just want to convey to you right off the bat that we're very fortunate in the quantum community because we get along, we all work together and we're not fighting each other. That can be rare in the academic world.

I'm a professor in physics at the University of Calgary, director of the Institute for Quantum Science and Technology at the University of Calgary, and I'm lead investigator of Quantum Alberta, which is a loosely knit community of quantum scientists and technologists across Alberta. That's our vehicle to help us become even stronger in quantum science and technology.

I'm also a scientist with the Creative Destruction Lab, both the quantum stream at the University of Toronto and the prime stream at the University of Calgary. In this role, I mentor and evaluate venture start-ups. That has been extremely helpful because it gives me, as an academic scientist, a very good perspective on what it takes to make successes in the venture world.

In Alberta, our strengths cover the spectrum of the strategic quantum areas that you've been hearing about. We work on quantum sensing, quantum-secured communication, quantum computing and quantum materials. The names change and the number varies, but that's roughly the four areas that we talk about.

Soon I'll be appointed the scientific director of Calgary’s Quantum City initiative. That's a partnership between the University of Calgary; the City of Calgary; anchor industry partner Mphasis, an Indian IT company that is setting up its world quantum computing headquarters in Calgary; and the Province of Alberta. Quantum City's focus, which I'll be leading, is about developing Alberta’s quantum ecosystem, so it's not just the academic side but really all levels, to make sure that we have a successful quantum ecosystem that meets the expectations and needs of all stakeholders.

Quantum City’s priorities include collaborating with quantum scientists and technologists across Canada. I was in discussions with Alexandre Blais and Norbert Lütkenhaus earlier. We're not trying to compete with each other. We want to find ways where we each understand our complementary strengths and can work together to make great success.

We also understand the importance of working internationally, so our priority is also to work internationally. As we've heard in this hour and the previous hour, the resources coming in are not sufficiently large that we could become the world's greatest, so we have to work strategically, cognizant of the security issues, on how to make sure we are working with others to make Canada great in quantum science and technology.

Our own priorities at Quantum City are proof-of-concept and prototype development for quantum components, devices and systems. We are working towards training a quantum workforce. We heard about talent. One of the focuses we have is not on training people in quantum, but training people who don't know quantum to be able to use quantum tools.

Also, our goal in Alberta is to maintain and enlarge our community of world-class researchers in quantum sensing, communication and computing. I think of us as lean and mean. Alberta is a player on the national scene, but we have not had the same investment. We're very happy about that, because other priorities have existed, but now we want to enter the stage at the same level and not compete with the others, but rather, find ways to build on the strengths that have been established across Canada.

I note that we're progressing quickly to establish the world’s first professional master’s degree in quantum computing. It's software focused, with a plan to admit students in September 2023. We've been doing our industry discovery, and industry in Canada and beyond is showing great enthusiasm for taking on interns and graduates from this degree.

I want to finish by mentioning another point that could be relevant to this committee. I maintain a strong international research and outreach profile. My international activities are very important to me.

I do a lot of outreach in Africa, but I also have strong involvements with China and with India. I'm cognizant of security. Some of the questions that come up, and certainly in the past hour, do overlap sometimes. I'm one of those people where, in talking about security issues and all this kind of stuff, in my international activity, I'm sometimes a topic of conversation. I just want to make sure people are aware of that here.

I maintain the strong international activities, cognizant of geopolitical and all these other security issues. I do so partly because Canada is a great beneficiary of these international links. Many good things do flow to Canada as a consequence, and somehow we need to manage things so that Canada's needs and security are well looked after but we don't cut off contacts with others if we can avoid cutting off those contacts.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joël Lightbound]

Thank you, Mr. Sanders.

For our first round of questions, we'll start with MP Kram for six minutes.

[Michael Kram, Conservative, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses for joining us today on a Friday afternoon.

In the first hour, the committee heard that the federal government was in the process of developing a national quantum strategy. I wonder if each of the witnesses could offer their input as to what they would like to see in the government's national quantum strategy.

Any one of the witnesses may answer, but all of the witnesses would be preferable.

[Dr. Barry C. Sanders]

Alexandre, you can go first.

[Dr. Alexandre Blais]

Well, I did address the national quantum strategy in my introduction. I mentioned that being strategic about the use of these funds was important and that making choices is something we have to do. We cannot excel in everything quantum; at some point choices will have to be made. At the moment, the investments through NSERC are tagged “quantum”, but NSERC does not make any strategic choices. This is good. It will continue to allow researchers to explore different avenues.

That said, I believe now that making strategic investments that bring together Canada and Canadian researchers around common goals would be a great way to go forward. I think that, if we can define community-based goals around which we can attract enough interest in Canadian researchers, we would have a chance to make research have a large impact.

[Dr. Norbert Lütkenhaus]

Maybe I can add to this one.

I think there are two aspects. Of course, we need to finance basically the research infrastructure, so what investment is needed so we can build the thing, like our nano facilities that we need?

The second point is, indeed—and I agree here with Dr. Blais—that we need to have projects that really match what the community thinks need to be done. This one needs to be matched, of course, with the need of the government and the industry. At the Institute for Institute for Quantum Computing, we're going by formulating these kinds of projects as lighthouse projects. We really say these stay together, we say these things should be done, and we will start marching on that one.

We think that's a really good discussion as well to have at the national level and, indeed, to think about what are those things that really define what we should be doing. I think that's a very important part of the process. We should not just funding little projects here and there; we need to talk about strategy.

Thank you.

[Dr. Barry C. Sanders]

Okay, I'll jump in.

I like what I see being rolled out, and my Alberta colleagues like it. The way I perceive the national quantum strategy is that it's different from the AI strategy from Genome Canada. It's really saying that we have existing mechanisms to provide funding and we'll do a quantum bump in funding. It kind of lowers the bar a bit for all kinds of projects. There are big projects like CFI/MSI programs. There's internship through Mitacs, etc. I see this as a great step. We have all these existing mechanisms. This doesn't put us in quantum on the spot saying that we're somehow treated as special.

These different agencies are really experienced in knowing what they're looking for and vetting the proposals. This idea of a quantum bump to every possible funding envelope and having us go through the normal procedure I think is a real strength.

It does matter to us in Alberta a lot because, again, in some ways we're a new kid on the block. How much do we direct our funding towards maintaining existing strengths versus letting up-and-comers step in? I think this is a good way to do it.

[Michael Kram, Conservative, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Professor Blais, you said a couple of times that strategic choices would have to be made. Could you elaborate a little bit on what strategic choices will have to be made for Canada and where we should maybe focus our efforts and what areas might have to be left by the side of the road, so to speak?

[Dr. Alexandre Blais]

The answer I'm going to give is based on an initiative that our neighbours to the south have had in place for several years. Two research funding agencies in the United States, the Army Research Office and the Department of Energy, send challenges out to the community. They are challenges established by actors in the community, to which the community has an opportunity to respond. These challenges must involve multiple research teams across the country, and they also include participants in foreign countries. In fact, my own group receives funding resulting from those initiatives. These challenges, or strategic choices, are the work of the community, which proposes the avenues that it thinks are the most promising. Then, in collaboration with those research funding agencies, the choices are made and funding is granted.

[The Chair, Liberal, Joël Lightbound]

Thank you, Mr. Blais.

Mr. Kram, your speaking time is up.

I will now turn the floor over to Viviane Lapointe for six minutes.

[Viviane LaPointe, Liberal, Sudbury, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I would inform you that I will be splitting my time today with my colleague, Mr. Dong.

My question is for Professor Blais.

Can you tell us about the potential use of quantum detection, particularly in mining and medicine? Since I come from Sudbury, I would very much like to know what benefits Canada might derive from quantum information in those sectors.