Sovereign High-Performance Entangled Photon Source for Quantum Networking (QNET-EPS)

The UK needs a reliable domestic supply of devices that produce entangled photons—pairs of light particles whose quantum properties are linked across distance—to build a national quantum network by 2035. No mature entangled photon source hardware exists anywhere in the world, and the UK has no domestic supply chain for it. Without these sources, the UK cannot develop or test the quantum communications systems that would underpin a future quantum internet. The project aims to close that gap by developing both the technology and the manufacturing capability on home soil. If successful, the work would give the UK a sovereign source of high-performance entangled photon pairs. That would directly support research into new quantum applications and eventually enable commercially viable quantum networking services. The most immediate impact would be on secure communications infrastructure: quantum networks can transmit information in ways that reveal any eavesdropping, making them fundamentally harder to intercept than conventional fibre-optic cables. The project does not itself build the quantum internet, but it supplies the essential component that makes it possible.