We are excited to release our latest white paper, dedicated to quantum sensing, a field often described as the most mature branch of the second quantum revolution, yet one whose reality is far more fragmented, nuanced, and strategically rich than the headline suggests. The report is the result of months of research and in-depth conversations with the CEOs, scientists, and industrial players building the future of the sector.

This work has also been more than a market study for us: it actively shaped our thesis and our due diligence on recent investments. Our participation in SBQuantum’s $4M seed round, announced last week alongside Quantacet and Investissement Québec, is a direct illustration. SBQuantum’s diamond magnetometers sit at the heart of the defense, navigation, and public safety use cases we explore in depth in the report.

Executive Summary

Quantum sensors include diverse technologies leveraging quantum states to achieve performance beyond conventional sensors:

• Superconducting devices have offered record sensitivities since the 1960s, but they have faced field deployment constraints.
• Atomic and ion devices have recently achieved record performance. They have been undergoing an important miniaturization effort in the 21st century.
• Solid-state spin defects – NV centers in diamond and beyond – provide unique access to nanoscale and multimodal sensing.
• Photonics is undergoing renewal with integrated platforms, optomechanics and quantum states of light.

Each technology has distinct sensitivity, robustness or form factor advantages. The key to quantum sensing success is therefore a careful match between technology and applications.

Some industries will be more impacted:

• Quantum sensors will offer access to new measurement regimes in body imaging (including human-machine interface) and molecular biosensing.
• Quantum sensing in industry focuses on high-value use cases like chip inspection and non-destructive testing. Mastering integration into manufacturing workflows is essential for adoption.
• For navigation, they provide alternatives or complements to GNSS through magnetic, gravitational, inertial and timing measurements, with military and spatial as important drivers. Resilience, portability and sensitivity are equally required, along with new accurate maps.
• In the energy domain, quantum gravimetry and magnetic sensing can improve subsurface characterization and infrastructure monitoring. But robustness and form factor are critical.
• Quantum detectors bring sensitivity and stealth advantages in security and defense, with an important willingness to pay.
• Many quantum sensors originate from fundamental matter, particle and astrophysics experiments, which continue to push towards extreme sensitivity.

The quantum sensing commercial ecosystem has remained relatively small compared to computing and communication: despite their technological readiness, translation of laboratory performance into field operation and market adoption have been the main roadblocks so far. Yet the military and sovereignty stakes explain important public funding.

Quantum sensing is therefore a fragmented field, where matching technologies specificities to market needs requires expertise for significant value creation. Informed surveys will also be key to spot the next major sensing paradigms stemming from material science, qubits development or quantum states manipulation.

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A glimpse of what you will find in the full report:

Quantum sensing is not one market, it is a constellation of markets. Every application, from ultralow-field MRI to NV centers for chip inspection, from atomic gravimeters to optical clocks, answers a radically different set of specifications. As Jérôme Michon (InSpek) puts it in our pages: “Everyone needs sensors, but the devil is in the details.”

Beyond product-market fit, a second challenge runs throughout the report: adoption. Sadegh Raeisi (Foqus) points to the language gap with healthcare practitioners. Ronald Walsworth (EuQlid) reflects on the almost cultural timing with which each industry decides to switch to a new technology. Quantum sensing is doing today the hard work that quantum computing, and AI, will have to do tomorrow: moving from a “playing-around tool” to large-scale economic deployment.

Inside, we unpack the four main technology families, their promises and bottlenecks, before diving application by application: healthcare, industry, navigation, energy, defense, fundamental science. Throughout, we hear directly from the entrepreneurs shaping the field.

Thanks Malo Le Gall for leading this nice project at Quantonation ! Full report here.

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