QNu Labs, the first company in India to offer commercially available quantum safe security products announced the launch of a QKD (Quantum Key Distribution) system with a range beyond 100kms and a QRNG (Quantum Random Number Generator) Chip – Ikaria, a first by any private entity in the country and a handful across the world. This newest milestone by QNu is a key step in the direction of a quantum safe India.

QNu has demonstrated differential phase shift quantum key distribution at 105 km in their Bangalore R&D Lab generating secure 10-15 AES keys per sec. The quantum channel comprised of a standard telecom fiber was used for the demonstration. The photons were encoded in the relative phase information of weak coherent pulses working in quantum regime at 1 Gigahertz rate. Secure symmetric keys generation was demonstrated considering the hybrid attacks. This is an enhanced range product with ability to have unconditional security levels needed for point-to-point communication for military grade works. This product has new algorithms which will lead to other variants like hub and spoke for larger area coverage and point to multipoint which are at various stages of development and testing.  The QKD 105 km has significance from practicality of usage for a longer-range intercity network that can be protected.

QNu also launched its QRNG Chip – Ikaria which offers the highest-possible randomness and robustness for random number generation and enhanced security. QNu harnesses the randomness from the source of radioactive decay and extends it to the applications on the chip without introducing any bias. This chip finds its applications in IoT, PoS systems, mobile and security applications, where true randomness needs to be available from chip level itself in turn providing much-needed security for today and the future.

Commenting on this milestone, Sunil Gupta, Co-Founder and CEO at QNu Labs said: “Our vision is to see a new digital, hyper connected and quantum computing ready and secure world on a new trust platform conceived using quantum physics and enabled through quantum and post quantum cryptography.”

Vivek Shenoy, CTO at QNu Labs said: “Achieving 100+kms of QKD is a major step forward for QNu and an endorsement of its technical capability. With the platform approach that QNu has taken for development of QKD system, we were able to quickly upgrade our system from 40kms to 100kms. The approach has helped us to do continuous improvement on the product specifications.”      

Head of Research at QNu Labs, Anindita Banerjee added: “Reaching a distance of 105 km with Armos QKD system is a significant milestone. This gives a very practical usage and coverage model for most networks. The system can be calibrated for any distance till 105 km.  We started with optical path simulation, calibration of parameters, performance testing at 40km, 65km and 105km, rigorous data analysis, security analysis and randomness-evaluation tests of keys generated by QKD for each distance. We are excited and this gives us the motivation and confidence to continue to enhance our product capabilities.”