Hartford Business Journal

HARTFORDBUSINESS.COM | AUGUST 10, 2026 11 © 2011 BlueScope Buildings North America, Inc. All rights reserved. Butler Manufacturing ™ is a division of BlueScope Buildings North America, Inc. Borghesi Building & Engineering Co., Inc. has "Building Ideas that Work" Does your business need: • New space? • An addition? • Renovation of your current location? www.borghesibuilding.com | 860.482.7613 2155 East Main Street, Torrington, CT 06790 flows to UConn as the lead institution, but the broader effort is coordinated through QuantumCT, a nonprofit partnership among UConn, Yale University, the Connecticut State Colleges and Universities system and the state. QuantumCT is led by interim CEO Vivek Ramakrishnan. Its board is searching for a permanent CEO after Albert Green departed following about a year in the role. QuantumCT plans to open offices this fall at 101 College St. in downtown New Haven — the new life sciences tower developed by Winstanley Enterprises — creating a hub where researchers, startups, industry partners and workforce programs can collaborate. UConn also plans to establish its first New Haven office there, while QuantumCT is evaluating additional locations in Hartford and Storrs. Southern Connecticut State Univer- sity will lead workforce development efforts, while Connecticut's commu- nity colleges will help build a pipeline of technicians and other workers needed by the emerging industry. The New Haven cluster is already home to some of the nation's leading quantum researchers. Yale physicist Rob Schoelkopf co-founded Quantum Circuits, a Yale spinout acquired earlier this year by California-based D-Wave in a $550 million deal. Schoe- lkopf now serves as D-Wave's chief scientist and leads its New Haven research and development center, which has expanded its workforce by 40% since the acquisition, according to the company. D-Wave describes New Haven as a long-term hub for quantum R&D. The region's academic credentials were further bolstered when Michel Devoret, Schoelkopf's co-founder at Quantum Circuits and a Yale professor emeritus, shared the 2025 Nobel Prize in physics. O'Keefe called D-Wave Connecti- cut's first anchor quantum company and said the state is in discussions with other quantum firms about locating operations here. AdvanceCT said it is in early talks with more than 15 quantum-related companies about establishing or expanding a presence in Connecticut. A shared quantum testbed is another key part of the strategy. Because quantum computers remain prohibitively expensive, QuantumCT and industry partners, including D-Wave, plan to develop shared facilities that give startups and researchers access to the technology without requiring them to build or buy their own systems. "We want to give our startups, our research scientists, our research universities the ability to test quantum algorithms, to test the application of quantum technologies in real time," O'Keefe said. Startups could also tap seed capital through Connecticut Innovations, the state's quasi-public venture capital arm, which last year launched a $50 million AI/Q Fund to invest in artificial intelligence and quantum companies. Real-world uses The state's goal is to accelerate adoption of quantum technologies by Connecticut companies, and some of the first commercial uses are already emerging. In aerospace and defense, one of the most promising applications is quantum sensing, which could trans- form navigation systems for aircraft and submarines. "Imagine you wake up one day and have no access to GPS," Alpay said. "How do you navigate?" His teams at UConn are developing ultra-sensitive quantum sensors that could determine position by measuring tiny variations in Earth's magnetic and gravitational fields. Sikorsky, Pratt & Whitney, RTX and Electric Boat are all partners. Quantum sensors are the industry's most mature application, offering precision gains in positioning, navigation, timing and imaging, said Andreas Roelofs, vice presi- dent of research for RTX. Quantum computing sits farther out, he said, with the potential to solve problems beyond today's supercomputers, from discovering advanced materials to refining aerodynamic designs. The RTX Technology Research Center in East Hartford has worked with QuantumCT since its inception, helping define industry-relevant challenges through seed projects with UConn and Yale faculty-student teams, Roelofs said. He believes Connecticut is "uniquely qualified to build a quantum corridor." Boehringer Ingelheim, whose U.S. headquarters sits in Ridge- field, and Pfizer, which operates a major research campus in Groton, are working with QuantumCT on computing molecular interactions to design drugs "with extreme preci- sion," Alpay said. Financial services and insurance companies also see potential. Travelers, which has a large office footprint in Hartford, and Synchrony have partnered with the effort since its early days, Alpay said, initially focusing on encryption that future quantum computers won't be able to crack. Eventually, the technology could help insurers better price risk and help financial institutions make faster, more accurate predictions and investment decisions. Long-term play Unlike many economic devel- opment initiatives, Connecticut's quantum strategy won't be judged by the number of jobs it creates in the next year or two. O'Keefe said the state's investment is aimed at building the infrastructure needed for an industry that could take years to mature. "The time to start laying the ground- work is now," O'Keefe said. "You can't start in 10 years when others have forward invested and expect to have a meaningful industry here."

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