RoNaQCI: Romania’s Quantum Network by IonQ & ID Quantique
Romania's Historic Quantum Network (RoNaQCI) Protects Over 1,500 Kilometres of National Infrastructure with IonQ and ID Quantique
Overview
By building a massive quantum communication network in Romania, IonQ reached a major cybersecurity milestone in Europe. This infrastructure protects essential data transfers from sophisticated internet threats with over 1,500 kilometers of fiber and Quantum Key Distribution. The project links six major metropolitan areas and several academic institutions as part of EuroQCI. Quantum-secure technologies defend government, healthcare, and banking nationally, as shown by this deployment. This achievement strengthens the company's position as the world's premier quantum networking solutions provider.
RouNaQCI: Romanian National Quantum Communication Infrastructure
ID Quantique (IDQ), a subsidiary of IonQ (NYSE: IONQ), announced today that it has deployed the technology behind the Romanian National Quantum Communication Infrastructure (RoNaQCI). This milestone built one of Europe's largest and most complex operational Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) networks. This deployment is second only to Chinese infrastructure in importance worldwide.
National Science and Technology University To deploy RoNaQCI, POLITEHNICA Bucharest and RoEduNet, Romania's research and education network, collaborated. This countrywide network uses solely IonQ's commercially available QKD technology, proving that quantum-secure communications are scalable and functional for national infrastructure.
A New European Quantum Security Benchmark
The deployment is essential in the EU's objective to protect vital communications from cyberthreats, particularly those from powerful quantum computers. Romania is a leader in the EuroQCI effort to build a continental quantum communication network utilizing this technology.
The Romanian network is vast. The 36 quantum-secured wires extend nearly 1,500 kilometers. Interestingly, this one country project has installed almost 20% of Europe's terrestrial quantum communications equipment.
"IonQ is proud to support this extensive quantum-secure communications network across Europe," commented Niccolo de Masi, chairman and CEO of IonQ. He noted that the deployment shows QKD's potential to scale to protect national security and private data in government, healthcare, research, education, and data centers.
Links major metropolitan hubs
Bucharest, Iași, Timișoara, Craiova, Cluj-Napoca, and Constanța—six of Romania's biggest cities—are connected by the high-security RoNaQCI network. End-to-end encryption keys ensure data security on the network.
Wavelength Division Multiplexing is used in the advanced design. This allows the transmission of quantum keys in the C-band alongside ordinary data traffic in the network's urban areas, indicating quantum security is possible in present telecommunications infrastructures.
Prof. Pantelimon George Popescu, Head of the Quantum Computing Laboratory at POLITEHNICA Bucharest, says the infrastructure provides a “practical foundation for secure data exchange” and promotes the European goal of interoperable quantum networks.
A Teamwork Success
A collaborative approach made RoNaQCI deployment successful. Twelve Romanian institutions, seven research institutes, and three government organizations joined the effort. ID Quantique supplied all national QKD systems to ensure network performance and compatibility.
Grégoire Ribordy, vice president of science at IonQ and co-founder of ID Quantique, said the network is the result of over 20 years of work to make quantum key distribution a reliable infrastructure for businesses and governments. He added that the project shows that present telecommunications infrastructure can support large, complex networks.
IonQ Expands throughout Europe
IonQ has taken several risks to accelerate quantum-secure communications in EMEA, including Romania. These are recent firm activities:
Slovakia will establish its first quantum communication network with the Slovak Academy of Sciences.
Launch of Geneva Quantum Network.
Italy: Supporting the Q-Alliance with Italian authorities.
Oxford, UK: IonQ's EMEA headquarters shows its commitment to European quantum efforts.
Leading Quantum Era
IonQ is smashing quantum computing and networking records. The company set a global record of 99.99% two-qubit gate fidelity in 2025. IonQ Tempo, their next computer, will help partners like AstraZeneca, NVIDIA, and Amazon Web Services innovate in financial modeling, materials research, and medication development.
IonQ is becoming the top “merchant supplier” of integrated quantum solutions with operations in South Korea, Switzerland, networking, computing, and sensing with over 1,300 employees.
The RoNaQCI network begins operations and serves as a model for other EuroQCI countries, ushering in the “Quantum Era” of communication.