SK Telecom has become the first private company in Asia to be selected for research funding under Horizon Europe, the European Union's large-scale research and innovation program. With Korea this year securing associate member status in Horizon Europe as the first Asian country, this marks the first case of a domestic company directly receiving European research funding to participate in global joint research.
SK Telecom said Friday that it will carry out a next-generation quantum cryptography development project, selected as a Horizon Europe task, over the next three years together with research institutions and companies in three European countries. Horizon Europe is the EU's flagship research and innovation program. Its total budget reaches approximately 95.5 billion euros (about 170 trillion won).
The project aims to implement and demonstrate a next-generation quantum key distribution (QKD) system based on QPIC-AI (Quantum Photonic Integrated Circuit-AI). QKD is a technology that uses the properties of quantum mechanics to allow both sides of a communication to simultaneously generate and distribute encryption keys. Because the physical state of the quantum changes the moment a third party attempts to intercept information in transit, it is regarded as the most secure among existing cryptographic systems.
Existing QKD systems required precision optical components to be assembled into separate, individual pieces of equipment, making the systems large and costly to build. In this project, SK Telecom plans to consolidate optical components that had consisted of multiple devices into a single small chip based on semiconductor processes, dramatically miniaturizing the system and raising the prospects for commercialization.
Participants in the project include Greece's National Centre for Scientific Research Demokritos (NCSRD), the Austrian Institute of Technology (AIT), and German semiconductor startup Sinogate UG. SK Telecom will handle development of the PIC-based QKD system, application of AI functions, and the construction and verification of a QKD testbed, while the Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI) will carry out development of the optical chips for the transmitter and receiver of the PIC-based QKD. The joint research with European countries is also expected to contribute to international standardization of quantum cryptography technology. Ryu Tak-gi, head of network technology at SK Telecom, said, "This Horizon project selection served as an occasion to confirm SK Telecom's research and development capabilities in quantum cryptography technology," adding, "Through the development of a next-generation QKD system that combines PIC technology and AI technology, we will strengthen our leading position in the global quantum cryptography communications market."
