Programmable light processors, built for the quantum era.
Q-Memory designs programmable, room-temperature photonic processors: chips that steer and mix light under software control. We build them for quantum research labs today and quantum data centers tomorrow, with an AI mode on the same chip.
Try the simulatorFollow our progress
What we are building
A photonic processor is a network of tiny light paths on a chip. Where paths meet, a tunable interferometer decides how much light goes each way. Set all of them from software and the chip performs a chosen operation on the light passing through. Change the settings and it performs a different one, on the same chip.
Room temperature
The processor chip runs at room temperature. Single-photon detectors, where an experiment uses them, sit in a compact cooler.
Programmable
One chip, many experiments, reconfigured in software.
Made with chip-industry methods
Wafer-scale lithography on a low-loss material that is well established for photonics.
VION in your browser
VION is our four-channel programmable mesh, the proof of concept we are building now. Our online simulator runs the same design, so you can program it before the hardware exists.
- Set each phase shifter and watch the light re-route through the mesh.
- Pick a target operation and let the simulator program the chip to match it.
- Swap lasers, photon sources and detectors on a virtual lab bench.
- Try a new virtual chip: each one carries its own fabrication imperfections.
A memory layer for light
Today’s programmable photonic chips hold each setting by continuously heating a small part of the chip. That costs power, produces heat, and makes the chip drift.
Our memory layer (patent filed) is designed to hold settings at near-zero power, for processors that are more stable and lower-power, which matters when many chips share a rack.
Where the work stands
VION is being built in-house for November 2026. VION+, our first chip, follows from CORNERSTONE’s foundry run in Q2 2027. AXIOM, the product, follows in two versions: AXIOM-B in Q3 2027 and AXIOM-D in Q4 2027.
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light channels in VION, our fibre-mesh proof of concept
Design
6
light channels in VION+, our first foundry chip
Design
June 2026
UK patent application filed.
On record
Every figure on this site says how we know it.
- Design
- A property of our design.
- On record
- A matter of public record.
A roadmap built on measured results
Each phase builds on measured results from the one before, so every step rests on proven performance.
VION: our fibre-mesh proof of concept
A four-channel programmable mesh built in-house from catalogue parts, with the light in standard fibre. It proves our electronics, calibration and measurement chain.
VION+: our first chip
A six-channel chip from a commercial foundry, on the process AXIOM will use. It carries the quantum tests: two-photon interference and a two-photon logic gate.
AXIOM: one chip for quantum and AI
A sixteen-path programmable processor that runs quantum circuits, quantum machine learning and an AI mode on the same chip. AXIOM-B is the base processor; AXIOM-D adds photon sources and detectors in one rack.
XYRON and beyond: toward quantum data centers
The hardware after AXIOM, in the same two versions, and classical optical processing on the same platform.
Follow the build
We send an update when a milestone is reached.