A London-based company, founded in 2009 and led by Andersen Cheng, that develops encryption designed to withstand attacks from future quantum computers.
Post-Quantum, also known as PQ Solutions, builds encryption that is designed to stay safe when large quantum computers arrive. Today's widely used encryption could in theory be broken by such machines, so researchers have been designing new methods that quantum computers cannot easily beat. The company's algorithm, Classic McEliece, was a finalist in the code-based category of the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) post-quantum cryptography programme. In February 2020 the company merged its entry with one from the cryptographer Daniel Bernstein. It also works on secure multi-party computing and digital signature schemes, and describes products covering encryption, transmission and identity.
The company has carried out post-quantum encryption research since 2009. Its chief executive is Andersen Cheng, an entrepreneur who previously sold cybersecurity businesses and earlier led European credit risk at JPMorgan in the late 1990s. Co-founder CJ Tjhai helped design the protocol. The company says its aim is to protect information against current threats and future challenges, so clients can operate safely and with confidence, for banks, governments and blockchain users. It was also incubated in the Barclays Techstars Accelerator.
Post-Quantum is based in London. A 2020 article describes it working from a modest office near a central London train station, and a business directory lists its address as Southwark Bridge Road. This is a small UK company, and its work is done in London rather than across a wide network of sites.
The 2020 article put the team at 14 staff plus ten contractors, while a later directory listing says about five employees. Those figures are different and neither is recent, so we cannot say how big the team is today. The article describes a founder-led company that works on hard mathematical problems and a product line that includes a forthcoming VPN. We found no culture material from the company itself.
The work needs mathematicians and cryptographers, software engineers, and security and business staff who explain the risk to customers. If you like maths and puzzles, this is a good example of where they lead: code-breaking and code-making underpin banking, government and the internet. A degree in maths, computer science or physics is the usual route. Check the company's current website before relying on this account, as the pages we read are several years old.
Website: www.post-quantum.com
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