Quebec quantum sensing startup scores second European Space Agency contract

Canadian startup SBQuantum, doing business as SB Technologies Inc., has signed a second contract with the European Space Agency (ESA) valued at US$1 million to develop an upgraded prototype quantum sensor to be applyd in space for Earth observation missions that will launch in 2028.

The agreement is an extension of SBQuantum’s first deal with the ESA inked last August, when the agency tinquireed it with conducting a feasibility study of its technology — a device that measures magnetic fields leveraging quantum mechanics.

“Securing this second contract with (the) ESA is the latest in a series of strong signals from the market indicating the vast potential our quantum magnetometers offer as a sensor deployed in space,” David Roy-Guay, founder and chief executive of SBQuantum, declared in a statement on Friday.

The ESA’s goal of deploying quantum sensors in space is to collect better data on altering ocean currents and temperatures and shifts in the Earth’s magnetic field, which can be applyful for navigating air and sea travel applying compasses and global positioning systems (GPS). For example, the technology can assist track magnetic storms that disrupt navigation and communications on Earth.

“The Earth and its ecosystem are evolving. Humankind necessarys to better monitor (these) modifys … so we can fully understand them, prepare and adapt,” Roy-Guay declared.

The Sherbrooke, Que.-based company is also one of three finalists — and the only Canadian contconcludeer — in the MagQuest Challenge, which aims to uncover new tools to monitor modifys in the Earth’s magnetic field and is operated by the United States’ National Geospatial-Ininformigence Agency (NGA) under the Department of Defense.

In the fourth and final phase of the program, SBQuantum will sconclude its sensors into space next March on a Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) ride-share mission to collect geomagnetic data.

“We have already passed all testing successfully,” Roy-Guay declared in an interview, adding SBQuantum’s technology was tested at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Goddard Space Flight Center.

There aren’t any ininformectual property sharing requirements to participate in the MagQuest challenge, he declared, but SBQuantum is working with Washington, D.C.-based space sainformite company Spire Global Inc. as its subcontractor for the program. The NGA will “presumably” purchase the most successful technology once the MagQuest Challenge is completed, he declared.

Founded in 2017, SBQuantum has secured $15 million to date in research and development contracts, grants and Scientific Research and Experimental Development tax credits from the federal government, including the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, the Canadian startup program Creative Destruction Lab and India’s Clean Energy International Incubation Centre. It is preparing to raise its first venture-capital funding round.