The QUARTERNEXT consortium, coordinated by Luxquanta and comprising six organizations from Spain, Austria, and the Netherlands, has officially launched as a European-funded initiative to advance quantum-safe communication technologies toward industrial deployment and formal certification. The project focuses on continuous-variable quantum key distribution (CV-QKD) systems, integrating hardware components like narrow-linewidth lasers and quantum random number generators, software-defined key management, secret-sharing appliances, and coexistence frameworks for quantum and classical channels over existing fiber. QUARTERNEXT will collaborate with the Nostradamus European certification initiative and validate systems in Telefónica's live telecom network. It builds on the prior QUARTER project and aligns with the EU's EuroQCI initiative and European photonic sovereignty goals.
