In this episode, host Frank La Vigne and his co-host Candace Gillhoolley sit down with Hillary Ogbodo, CTO of Almond Inc. and a passionate quantum researcher based in Nigeria. The conversation journeys from the challenges of fintech and credit systems in Africa, through Hillary’s personal fascination with quantum teleportation, to the future of quantum encryption and security.

They dive deep into quantum key distribution (QKD), real-world deployment hurdles, the fast-moving international race in quantum technology, and why the next five years could see QKD go from academic pilot to critical infrastructure. Whether you’re a quantum novice or an aficionado, this episode unpacks the global implications of quantum security and what it means for industries from finance to defense—plus, some unexpected stories about cryptography, satellites, and the power of curiosity.

Links

• Hilary on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/hillary-ogbodo-6352391b0/
• Watch on YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=frJ9wtou-hs

Time Stamps

00:00 Fixing credit in Nigeria

05:47 Explaining quantum data encryption

09:01 Detecting eavesdroppers with error rates

11:54 Discussing global quantum computing advancements

15:34 Quantum computing secrecy

16:41 Discussing QKD vs PQC algorithms

21:56 Getting into cryptography after 2002

24:31 Getting into quantum computing

27:26 Quantum teleportation research in China

30:35 Rural broadband accessibility issues

34:43 Wells Fargo tests quantum security

39:32 Quantum key distribution advancements

40:29 Discussing quantum resilient algorithms

44:04 Discussing encryption with engineers

Because we could have different countries that could have that technology and they wouldn't

say it again and just going to test it by attacking

systems, you know. So that fear, it's going to push

companies already seeing companies funding this research and it's going to

push companies to try and be secure so that

when that happens, they will be safe. So I feel like in the

next five years that QKD could actually see more real

world deployability and usability because we're already seeing it's been

deployed in different countries like China. And I'm sure

the US is, I'm sure the US has something that they're not telling us, to

be honest. Welcome to Impact Quantum.

Hello and welcome back to Impact Quantum, the podcast. We explore the emerging

industry that is quantum computing. And you don't need to be a

PhD in physics or a physicist. You just need to be a little

curious. And with that is the most quantum curious person I know, Candace Kahuli.

How's it going, Candace? It's going great, Frank. I, I, I'm very

excited. Today we are talking to Hillary

Ogbodo and he is the CTO of Almond

Inc. And what's actually the most exciting part is

he is in Nigeria. Oh, very cool. I love when we have

a conversation like this where we're all over the globe.

Absolutely. Well, welcome to the show, Hillary. Yeah, it's

nice to be here. It's nice to meet you, Frank. It's nice to meet you,

Candace. So what does

Almond Inc. Do? So we

are a fintech company where we, you know,

we're trying to fix the credit problem. And

in Africa, or starting from, you know, Africa's most populous country, which

is Nigeria, basically most people can't

access loans because there's no good credit

infrastructure. Because, you know, when people go to the bank to

borrow money, the bank doesn't know who is going to pay them, you understand?

So we provide loans to employees

of companies. So currently we're trying to start with people who

actually have a job. So we verify with your company

and you will have the, you are only able

to get a percentage of your salary as low and

the more you pay back, the more that percentage increases. And we get

your, you know, credit data, we use

that also. You could also pay your rents

using our app. So we're just basically checking out credit worthiness to, you

know, device a credit score which we then in return

give to the banks and the banks can know who they can borrow money

to and who it's going to pay back. So that's what we're currently doing. And

we focus on schools firstly.

Those are the first businesses that were focused on, you know, employees in schools,

universities, college, high school, and all of that.

So that's what we do. And we also provide, you know, other services

like bill payments from your electricity bills to your cable,

you know, also mobile money recharge. In our country, you

can. You have to buy data and credits

to make calls. Oh, okay. So, yeah, it's not like

in the US where you kind of like, you

know, buy a whole plan for a month and if you. If you use

up the fast megabytes, you still have access to Internet, but

it will be slower. That's how it is in the U.S. but here, once you

use it up, it's done. You're cut off. So they're like prepaid.

We have prepaid plans here that function that way here. Okay, interesting.

And I don't think people always complain about the credit scoring system and

all that. And it has its flaws, but I don't think people realize how. What

a fundamental bit of infrastructure that is,

imperfect as it may be here. But, yeah, no, it's a huge deal,

but it works. It works in the U.S. yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, that's just it,

right? Like, it's very easy to critique it in a working system. Right. And make

it better, but if you don't have it, that's in. That's also a problem

too. Yeah, it's a huge problem. Most people can get loans

to start businesses. So. Yeah. So, Hillary. So connect

me now. Connect the dots to quantum.

Okay, so like I said in our initial meeting,

right, that currently we don't obviously

have access to quantum computers. Right. So

me personally, now, I took the journey on quantum.

Right. I'm currently, like I told Candace, I'm currently completing my master's degree.

Oh, very cool. Yeah. So my thesis is actually on

quantum. Very cool. So. So what

first sparked your interest in that in quantum?

So it was. Funny story. It was about teleportation.

So. Really? Yeah, it was about teleportation. So I was

just thinking about it and I was like, there has to be, you know,

studies relating to teleportation.

Sorry about this. There has to be some studies relating to

teleportation in the past. And, you know, I was

researching on it and I found the subject

topic, quantum teleportation, where you could basically

teleport data through, you know, light particles,

photons, right. When they are entangled

together. So if a data is passed into this photon,

it automatically appears in the second Photon because they are

merged, they are entangled. Quantum entanglement. Yeah, it was, it was a whole

thing because I had to go into quantum physics. It was a

huge field. So I had to narrow it down to what I understand

because I studied computer engineering and I'm currently mastering

in software engineering. So I looked

at, you know, the current system, right?

Every system communicates. We are in the Internet, every system is

communicating with each other, right. And in

a case where a quantum computer, what's it

called, emerges like in the future, like it's going to emerge, right?

The way data is being transferred from one system to another is

that data is encrypted first for

it's transferred from point A to point B. So in a case where there's like

a third party, a malicious, a bad actor basically trying

to steal this data, they are just able to get access

to the encrypted form of the data. So now

it would take a classical computer a long

amount of time to decrypt that message. Right.

But with quantum computing. Quantum computing,

Quantum computers use qubits, which gives

them the ability to be in multiple states at the same time,

which leads to faster computation. And faster computation means.

Yeah, they're going to try to guess the patterns to break in that

encryption in a faster amount of time compared

to a classical computer. So I looked at secure

communication systems, which is what the

solution is currently trying to fix. So I

looked into how data is transmitted using the HTTPs, which

is TCP protocol, right. To

do this data encryption and all of that. So

my thesis is titled like an adaptive

key generation and exchange protocol

using QKD and

PQC Keeper. QKD is quantum key distribution.

Right. So basically it uses, what's

it called, it uses light photons to encrypt

information in a context. So photonics then.

So photonics, yeah. So yeah. So

basically it uses the principles of quantum mechanics

to encrypt data in a quantum channel.

Right. So there's something called quantum bits error rates.

Cuber. So what is quantum bit error rates? What it

does is it lets. Let's say I am Frank. Frank.

Frank is Alice and I'm Bob. Right.

Frank wants to send a key to me, Right.

So in the normal classical system, if there's a third party

Candace, who is trying to steal the keys that France, that Frank

is trying to send to me, if she's in the network,

Frank wouldn't know and I wouldn't know. So if she's

able to make away with the keys, I wouldn't know. Frank wouldn't know, but

we're still going to exchange the keys. But with qkd, it

uses the cuber rates. So there's something called the cube does quantum bit error

rates. Right. So it uses quantum bit error rates

to detect eavesdroppers, which is the third party

that's trying to make away with this data. So in a case where there's an

eavesdropper present, the quantum bit error rate is going to spike

up. So it's between 0.0.1,

0.01 to 0.11,

which tells I and Frank that this quantum channel is

safe from eavesdropper and has very little noise. But

in case it goes above 0.11, then we

know that Candice is in the network and she's trying to make away with the

keys that we are exchanging with it between each other.

So it tells me and Frank that we have to dispose these keys

and try to make a new one.

Yeah, because key distribution has been a consistent

issue in encryption for thousands of years. Right.

As long as there's been encryption. And this offers the chance to

solve that. Is the threshold fixed? Like, I know you gave a number. It

was probably just like an example number, but, like, is there some kind of

measurement that has to be done to figure out, like, hey, you know, this is

the threshold for someone's eavesdropping or not? Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

So, okay, so it's when a quantum channel

is the most healthy, when it's between 0.01

and 0.05 kilo quantum

bit error rates. Right. But in a case where it's between

0.06 to 0.11,

it means that noise has been introduced

into the quantum channel. Right. But it doesn't necessarily mean that there's a

third party. There's an eavesdropper. Right. So in a

case where it's then above 0.11,

then there's a potential eavesdropper in the network. So if you were dealing

with a situation that was potentially really sensitive, anything in that middle

range, you would be very. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

So it's best to transmit between 0.01, 0.05, but

you could also transmit between 0.06

to 0.0. Interesting. I don't want to go

ahead. Candice, what misconceptions did you have about

QKD early on that later changed?

Personally, I didn't have, what's it called, misconceptions.

The first goal was to fully understand what

QKD was and how it worked. Right.

And God bless Open source, there's a lot of information

online. So I focused on IBM's because

they have a lot of courses on it. I focus on IBM and Google.

Right. But I decided to go with IBM

Qiskit to, you know, work on this

project because it has a larger community.

IBM has been on quantum computing longer than Google,

I believe. I wouldn't say I had a misconception, but I would say

QK is pretty, pretty powerful and it has been adopted

in the UK in China. I think China

has built a 200 kilometer

actual quantum channel from Beijing to

Shanghai. Yeah, the innovations are. And I think China

also has. What's it

called, they created an operating system. This was last week. I, I saw it

on Twitter. So they created an operating system for quantum computers.

So it's showing that the space is evolving and it's evolving

fast. Yeah, we, we have to,

you know, secure the way we communicate.

No, absolutely, absolutely. And I think

there was an announcement this morning. I think Germany has built

finished a QKD system too. Like literally morning

it was announced. I mean this is, I mean it's a fast moving

field. Right. And I think that because again, talking about

infrastructure, people don't realize key distribution, whether it's quantum

or whether it's conventional. Yeah. Is critical for.

It's sensitive. It's critical for financial transactions. Everything.

Everything. The Internet. So yeah, I mean

to the Internet it's. Well, you should have it doesn't always

have it, but you should have it. You're right.

So like, are there any practical limitations of QKD

deployment that the hype doesn't

mention? I would say

the deployment of qkd, it's.

I'll use the word like, because there haven't been many

real world deployments. There haven't been many real world deployments

because getting. Trying to build a quantum channel.

It's. Yeah, it's. I wouldn't say it's the easiest.

Right. So I haven't personally looked in because I haven't actually

touched a quantum hardware. I've been mostly focused on, you know, the

software part of things. Right. So I wouldn't, I

wouldn't know what it takes to deploy a quantum

channel. Like, because the QKD needs a quantum channel to

operate you. You understand? So,

yeah.

So but the major, Should I word. The major blocker is that

quantum computers aren't. Should I say what. Readily

available. Yeah, yeah, currently. But

yeah, qkd. QKD is. I think it's the, it's going to be

the leading quantum resilient techniques

when it comes to, you know, key distribution and key encryption, you know, all of

that, I, I believe it's because there's pqc, which

PQC proves that's post quantum cryptography

algorithms. Right. They, they, they say that

it's, you know, it's matter, it's the, its

encryptions are going to be difficult for quantum computers to break.

But like, that's an assumption. It's not information theoretic

qkd, because they haven't actually tested most of these

encryptions on actual strong quantum computers.

So. That's right. It's all theoretical. I think people, that's a very good point. People

don't realize that like, it's not just because they, and if you look

fine, if you look in the fine print, it's just

they'll mention like this is likely to survive

exactly. In post quantum. But like they can't, they can't prove it yet. You

can't actually prove it. No. And even then, even. And like,

as I'm fond to say, I've said this multiple times in the show, like, as

the general public, we will probably not know when the

first real powerful quantum computer will be out there because

any pick your country, right. Anyone who figures this out first is going to have

a significant tactical advantage on the world stage. And there's.

In that circle, there's not really a lot of incentive to share research

just because it's the nature of the beast. But, but no, you're right.

Like, you know, and people, I think when we talk about quantum readiness and things

like that, we can't. You can assume

that things are going to be fine, but you can't rely on

things being fine. Right. There's different levels of

paranoia I suppose are warranted. One question

I have, what's the cost difference between

conventional QKD and quantum qkd?

I'm sorry, not qkd. Qkd, if you're not following, the acronym we use

is quantum key distribution. What's the added cost of qkd?

QKD mostly relies on, okay. Compared to

pqc. PQC algorithms. It's,

it's computational cost relies on the system

you are running it like the hardware you are running it on. Right,

okay, but when, but yeah, but when it comes to qkd, QKD

is mostly reliant on the quantum channel.

So how free from noise

the quantum channel is, the more keys

it generates. Okay, you

understand? So it doesn't like, compared to PQC algorithms

that rely on your

computing power of your Hardware to encrypt

as opposed to that. Because even on my work I

compared the. Okay. There are actually three because the work

is an adaptive key key encryption and

distribution of. What's it called? Framework. So it consists

of three algorithms, two quantum

resilient algorithms, and one classical algorithm for, you know,

fallback. So I use the classical DIP for hello man before the

classical encryption technique and PQCs Kiber

and then QKD. Right. So I actually compared

the overhead. I compare. I have

the. I wish I could share my screen here, to be honest. You should be

able to. And then. Yeah, you should be able to. We'll get. We'll grant

you the access if for some reason you don't have that access.

Yeah, I'm used to Google Meets, so. Oh, yeah, yeah,

yeah, yeah. In my daily life, I switch between Slack

teams, Google Meet, and what's the other one? Zoom.

My head's all over the place.

And for those listening on the podcast, we'll make sure we link to

YouTube video, which we. We have now, kid is all of

season four, right? Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay. Can you see my screen? We can see your screen. Yep.

Okay, so. Oh, cool.

Yeah, I had the whole presentation planned out.

Awesome. But yeah, this

is the evaluation results where I compared.

What's it called? So this is the classical die for Hellerman, the original.

And then this was the optimized version of the classical die for

element. Because with die for Helmet, you have to generate parameters

which you're going to use for the key generation. Right.

So this first version, I actually

ran it where we. Where I generate

the parameters and then the keys. Within the same

situation. Yeah. And then the second optimized one was

where I injected

pre generated parameters

so it didn't have to generate this parameter. So it basically cuts

the development, the key generation time by

more than half here. So.

Yeah. Yeah. So this was the. This

here is the overhead comparison versus the classical

dh. I compared each mode. That's the PKCR and the

QKD compared to the classical Diphel Hellman.

And the baseline obviously is the classical Diphel Hellman, which is.

It generates keys 8.5. It takes 8.15

milliseconds to generate a key which could be used for

encryption using your, you know, AES or

RSA. Right. So my

PQC generation time took

0.007 milliseconds. So like I said, extremely fast.

That's extremely fast. If you look at the other one, the other numbers

there. Yeah, that's extremely. That's impressive. I Would also

add that for those that are having trouble following us either on YouTube or

on the podcast, the encryption is a

very, very nuanced field. And I highly recommend, if you can

stomach the math and if you could stomach the read, There's a book called

Applied Cryptography. It's about yay thick.

It's by Bruce Schneier. I read one of the early editions.

Oh my God, I feel so old. In like 2001,

2002, you

weren't born yet. Yeah, yeah, yeah, but. But there's an updated one. I forget if

the COVID is red or blue now because I think the first version came blue

and then, then is red. But Anyway, there's a 25, 25th year

anniversary edition. Highly recommend that if you want to get into this

space, read that book because it will go through

that. In fact, everything you mentioned was all stuff I remember, except for the

quantum stuff, because again, 25 years ago, that wasn't the thing.

But I'm told that the 25th anniversary edition

does cover that. But that is, that is

the go to book, right? Particularly when you're talking about the D8 stuff. The diffie

or Dicey. I don't, I don't have to say, but Diffie Hellman exchange. Yeah. And

there's plenty of good YouTube videos that explain it too. But yeah, I knew what

you were talking about, but I don't think a lot of people would because fun

fact. Probably before you were born. One of the, One of the

ways I got into cryptography and understanding this was

because I had found myself out of a job

after having like a, you know, hotshot job at a bank and

the financial crisis in 2002 and post 9 11, I

had a startup that I had and one of the first. One of.

One of the things we tried for and didn't get was a Small Business

Administration tech challenge, which was for,

I think it was sbir Small Business Innovation Research, something where

it was basically diving into some very

weird corners of cryptography. And I remember reading that book

cover to cover like twice and

basically coming up with a pitch and proposal. Now, we didn't win it.

I didn't win it. But I learned a ton

of stuff that a normal. NET developer in the

early 2000s would have never touched. That actually has helped me a

lot in my career going forward on other projects I've been

on because I knew some of these weird, esoteric mathematical things.

Remember, you don't have to win the obvious contest in

order to win longer term. Also, fun fact,

part of this Sbir this request for information was.

About steganography, which is basically hidden

writing. And that's how I met my wife actually, because we

were talking about tech stuff and she knew what steganography was

and I was like, that's the type of woman you marry. So.

But you know, long story short, if this is a field that,

don't worry, there's a lot of scary math is a lot of scary formula, but

if you can get past that, into the conceptual parts of it, it's actually

not that bad. It's a bit like, it's a bit like

running, running a 10k right? Or a marathon, right? Maybe not like a marathon,

but like you just put one foot in front of the other and you keep

putting one foot in front of the other. You'll get to where you're going.

You may be tired at the end, but you will get there. And I think

that's a good metaphor for quantum in general, right? Like, can you stop

sharing screen unless you want to show your presentation again? Because I see myself

like a second ago. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But no,

I mean I think that's, you know, this is hard stuff, this is hard math,

right? But it's not impossible to crack, right?

It's not impossible to learn. You just have to keep going forward. And as long

as you're moving forward, there are going to be some days, honestly, I always

joke, like people ask me like, how much quantum do you actually do? And I'm

like, well, you know, one point I'd go 15 minutes and then I'd get a

headache and then I'd have to stop. Then I got to the point where I

get 30 minutes in and then I get a headache and I stop. Now I'm

about 45 minutes, right? And you know what do I

do quantum in my day job? Not yet, but I anticipate that in my

career because I have a, I have a three year old who's want to go,

who's want to go through college, right? I'm going to have to have

a career. And I think that, you know, that clearly the 2020s are all about

AI, but I think the 2030s are going to be largely about quantum, honestly.

But I think that a big part of this, and I think the first part

of Quantum that's going to be commercially viable and commercially successful is where you are

in the quantum security and quantum encryption space. Because that's

already a promising, that's already a financially rewarding

space for startups and industry. Yeah,

that's cool. I, I Always love when I can geek out, Candace. And someone with

some real, you know, like Diffie Hellman and stuff like that. I know where to

find them. You know where to. You're awesome. And that's just it too.

Right. This is a global phenomena. Right. We last show we released

was a lot of the attention is Silicon Valley. This. And

as an American who lives outside of Silicon Valley, I've

experienced this firsthand. I actually got a message from

a Silicon Valley startup. Yeah. Working on Quantum Nice. Got

a message and they said I should contribute to

their open source. Oh, that's cool. Yeah, you

know, I think I'm trying to get the name of the company,

but yeah, it was actually last week,

Thursday. Oh, cool. So, yeah, it's.

I think it's a promising field, to be honest. Oh, for sure, for sure.

And it's one of those fields where you just really need to have your curiosity

outweigh your fear of math. Right. Or you're just. Maybe you like math. I

don't know. But like, I have mixed feelings about it, honestly. And.

But my curiosity overwhelms it and it's just. You just have to be curious about

it. Right. And there's definitely there and it's a whole

ecosystem that's going to develop. I don't. That's the big reason since Candace

helped me read. The most important thing is actually the curiosity. Because,

yeah, I have, I have a very huge curiosity, but I have friends

who have very little curiosity, but they're really, really good

at maths, you know, logic, thinking. But like, you know,

that curiosity actually pushes you forward to learn more.

So, yeah, I think, I think that's a good thing. It's a good thing to

have. Yeah, no, absolutely.

Sorry, Candace, I don't want to monopolize the mic. No, no. I'm thinking about

satellites and I'm thinking about QKD and the global.

The globalization of it. Like, what role do we think that

satellites realistically can play when

scaling qkd? Okay, okay, so this. Okay. When I was

researching on quantum teleportation, there was. Yeah, I'm

sorry I'm saying China. But there was, there was, there was a researcher in

China which actually transported message. Transported it

was a little data from the satellites back to his,

you know, research hub, wherever it is, right.

With qkd. Because QKD actually requires, you know,

actual fiber optic cables like, you know, deployed under the

ground, you know, because that's what's going to form the quantum channel, basically. So

you need repeaters too. Every X number of kilometers. Right. Like that's the

other thing. And those are probably not cheap. They're not cheap.

No, they are not. But a satellite, you just need the satellite and a

repeater in orbit. Yeah. And it could serve

a wide area. Is that true? Is it. If you have a

satellite and a repeater. I, I wouldn't really know that, to be honest. Oh, I

was just curious. I, I was. Because we had a previous guest and we'd

love to have you on a panel. If we do like a panel event. You

can be with her because she's, she's worked with satellites. I know satellites.

Maybe they're. Maybe they don't have to have the same type of repeater. I don't

know. I don't know what that means, what that exactly means. But that put

a pin, we're going to put a pin in that idea and come back to

that in the future. Okay. Yeah. Well, what I know from satellites is that

they use waves. I've forgotten the, the

exact type of waves that are used to receive information

and send information. Even when it gets to trying to send information

like, you know, this. Space rovers. Yeah. Deployed

to the moon and satellites and. Sorry. To the moon and Mars

and all of that. So how they transmit that data is

using waves. I'm trying to remember the, the type of

waves. But yeah, to my understanding of

satellites, they use waves to send and receive information.

But what I know for. Is it info, Is it near infrared? Because somebody.

We had Catania Kunz.

Yes, yes, yes. The lady from western Canada and she

was saying it's some kind of particular frequency around

infrared frequency. It's not.

I forget, but it's somewhere in the infrared area. But that maybe that would explain

it. I don't know. Yeah, like. Yeah, I

haven't really, you know, looked into that. But I think

satellite is going to play a huge role because we're seeing, we're seeing

Elon with Starlink basically providing

Internet to remote areas that don't have

Internet. They should not have. Not like they should not have Internet, but like they

don't have the facilities to have Internet. So I think

satellite is going to play a huge role. Yeah.

Personally, I think. Oh, 100. Because you could put one

or a thousand things in orbit, you can serve the entire surface. Whereas

with, I mean, I live. So this is a big issue actually in the United

States too. At least when we were last house hunting a few years back,

if you were. And I live in the D.C. metro area. Right.

So like Montgomery County, Maryland is, you know. Right. Outside D.C.

but if you go in the western half of that, that it gets very rural

very quickly and broadband is not available. Like there's no

fiber, there's no cable, it's not guaranteed. And you know,

Montgomery county is next to the national capital. It's one of the

most, I think by income, one of the most affluent in

America and they have trouble getting broadband

to every house. Right. So you can imagine like,

you know, what chance does somebody in rural Kansas or Mississippi

or you know, rural parts of other parts of the world.

Yeah, you know, it's. Yeah. So I remember when I traveled

to Kenya and you know, we

went, we went hiking basically and I couldn't get a service.

There's someone there, Starlink, you know, I don't know how they do it on the

backpack. They have, they have the backpack and they have, you know, all that thing,

you know, plugged in and the person could literally communicate.

Oh, it gets cooler because apparently now one of the newer iPhones

and some of the newer Android phones, you don't need anything.

You can actually, if you pay extra for it on T Mobile, at least in

the US you can get access to Starlink. It'll send sms. You

can't send voice. Not yet, but so theoretically,

supposedly this phone and the plan I'm on will let me do it.

Supposedly I haven't tried it yet. But you will

have like to have like a Starlink. No, you won't have to

now. No. And I think I forget which iPhone

because I haven't had an iPhone in like 15 years now. But

why is that? You know, I switched to Android. No, I.

So this is actually a long standing thing. I have iPad

tablets, Android phones and Windows and Mac for desktops.

Because I used to be a Windows Phone developer and everything I had was Windows

this, Windows that. I was a one platform kind of believer

and when that platform failed, I was like, I'm in trouble. So I want to

have one of each. And iPhones are kind of expensive

so you know, you know, iPads are relatively cheap so I can stay.

I have one foot in each ecosystem. Basically. That's kind of my philosophy. Of course,

Linux too, but that not smart. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Once I've been burned, I try not to get burned again. Foreign.

I'm guessing you had a BlackBerry or. I did not have a

BlackBerry. No, I actually was a, I was a Windows believer for a long

time. So I actually had, I actually had a Windows Mobile before

like, you know, like was with the little pen and stuff before

Windows, the Nokia stuff. And now. So yeah,

I missed the BlackBerry thing, but yeah, so now I

have and I, you know, I kind of make sure I have a foot in

every platform. So that way this app isn't available here.

I'm like, that's fine, I'll just run it here, you know,

to swivel the chair. That's smart. That's smart.

Well, the more that you talk about qkd, it makes

me feel like everyone should make this a near term investment.

All, all enterprises for sure.

Finance, definitely finance. What other sectors do you think

what bag was? I think was, I think it was JP Morgan Chase.

They had a deal with Toshiba in the US integrating, you

know, what's it called, qkd into their system. So I, I don't know if they

integrated into their system, but I know they had like a test run and everything

in a university. I remember the name, but I, I remember

that story too. HSBC and JP Morgan Chase are the two that are really.

Hsbc. Yeah, yeah, those two are really on the, on the

cusp of like, are really on the cutting edge of getting it right now.

Will your local bank down? I'm sorry, go ahead. Yeah, even, even in the

UK. Yeah, there, there's, there's. I think HSBC2

is your UK company. I think it's actually based in Hong Kong, but they

have a big footprint. They bought a lot of UK banks basically. But yeah, so

they are, they're a global bank, kind of like J.P. morgan. Right. Like, but you

know, it's, but yeah, HSBC and J.P. morgan are the two names that always come

up whenever you see like news and in financial space. In regards

to quantum, those are the two names that come up. Wells Fargo, which

is an American bank, I think they had some kind of quantum random

number generator to help secure their transactions. But

again, like it's one of those things where like you said, like they did a

joint test run with the university. But of course this is such new technology,

you can't just buy it and install it. You have to research,

build it and then install it. So the fact that they're already doing it, I

think is the thing. And there's probably, I think you're gonna see more banks do

this. Some may, may want to pursue the headlines and some may

not. Critical and sensitive. Yeah,

system. Because. Right. You know, once the financials are attacked,

that's bad. I would imagine finance and

defense industry. Right. Whether it's Ministry of Defense or, you know,

Department of Defense or something. Government, Government agency. It always

comes down to Guns and money, doesn't it?

I think the first, the first time that. I think this was

last year. This was last year that, you know, this whole

Iran conflict was happening. The first thing that

I think that Israel did was they attacked Iran's

biggest blockchain company. Yeah, that would make sense. Yeah,

yeah. Literally wiped out more than 60 million. And then they

burnt it. They literally just burnt it. Just to show you that, like, we can

do this. So, so. Right, that's, that's very critical, you know, system.

It's a very critical system. And yeah, because you need

guns, you need, you need, you need money to buy guns and you need guns

to protect your money. Right? So, like it's, it's foundational to civilization.

Like it or not. Like it or not. Whether. And before guns, it was swords,

right? Yeah, exactly. You know, this is, this is not

a, an invention of the 21st century. This is four swords. It was

dragons. Oh, before swords. That's right.

No, you're right, though. You're right though. But I mean, like, you know, it's kind

of one of those things where sticks and stones. Yeah.

We ever see 2001. Right. It was the ape that used the bone

as a weapon. That, that one, like, I mean, this is.

Sadly, this has been stuck with humanity for

forever and it's probably going to be stuck with us forever too. But.

No, but it is interesting. But I think, I think any enterprise, any

Fortune 500, any top global enterprise is going to want

to start thinking about this. Right? Because if I'm a drug company, I

working on secret formula for the next Ozempic, right.

Or the next wonder drug, Right. I don't want that to get

leaked because of bad encryption. Right. Because that,

that's my business. So I would say that there's going to be two

companies left in the future. Those that did it early and those that wish they

did it early. And a lot of

people are actually like, doing it early. Like we're seeing,

we're seeing countries, funders and yeah. You know, try to

integrate this into their system. So it's. Yeah,

that's, I think the thing that struck me the most. Sorry, Candace. I mean,

how global this was. Right. Because I know you, Candice has done a lot of

work in terms of like Visualize and we have this in our Quantum Global report

and all that. But it's not just US

and China and Western Europe, Right. You, you see countries,

nation states, like getting involved in, in fostering the research

in this space early on. I think it's because there's the guns

and money aspect. Right. And as well as. It's just this is going to define

the next century potentially of business.

True. I was going to

ask. I'm sorry, go ahead. No, no, no, no, you go. Candace,

you've been, you've been. She's been very patient while we peeked out on crypto.

Let's, you know, if we look five years out, you know, what signals

should we watch that would tell us that QKD

has truly crossed from concept pilot

program to infrastructure reality.

Personally, I feel like QKD could actually

see real, real world usability and deployment

faster than quantum computers are going to hit the market.

Really? Yeah, personally, because,

because I feel like the fear of quantum computers

coming to light, it's, it's higher than actually

bringing the quantum computer to life. Because, because I think, because right

now Google, Google's Willow is the

quantum computing, the quantum computer with the most qubits.

I think it's 108. If I'm, if I'm something like that.

It. But yeah, Google's Willow is the, is the, I think one of the top.

He just added one, one of the IBM machines of. One of the top. Yeah,

yeah. Publicly known and publicly available. Thank you.

Exactly. That's all I want to say. Publicly known, public.

Yeah, exactly. Because we have different countries that could have that technology

and they wouldn't say anything and just going to test it by

attacking systems, you understand? So that's fear.

It's going to push, you know, companies, already seen companies funding this

research and it's going to push companies to

try and be secure so that when that happens

they will be safe. So I feel like in the next five years that

QKD could actually see more reward, deployability

and usability because we're already seeing, it's been deployed in

different countries like China. And I'm sure the US is, I'm sure

the US has something that they're not telling us, to be honest,

given the defense budget that this country has. And I

would be mad, honestly, based on what I pay in taxes, if they didn't

have something they didn't tell me about. Exactly. So I

think, because there are other, what's it called, quantum resilient techniques.

Right. So I haven't really researched on them, but there are some called the hash

based algorithm, there's the lattice, lattice based

algorithms. So there are so many algorithms that have been,

they've been researching on and all of that. But I feel like

companies, companies and government agencies

wouldn't want their system to be Exposed

So they have to look for a solution. Why? They also work on having their

own quantum computers, but I feel like the funds that

will be, you know, spent on security will be more

than, you know, what to be spent on development of this quantum computer. So I

think in the next five years we could see a lot of improvements. Like a

lot. Because, because tell me why, like, why would

China create an operating system for

quantum computers when there are no quantum computers yet?

It's just something I feel like in the next five years we're going to see

a lot of deployments of actual quantum

channels which will be used to transmit

information securely.

Excellent. That's so exciting. Very exciting.

So where can folks find out more about you and what you're

doing? Okay, so currently the,

the work, the research that I'm doing, it's for my thesis.

So like I said, I'm still, I'm almost done with

the actual, you know, research. So it's just going through. I'm kind

of going with my, you know, my supervisor and some of my professors.

Right. We're trying to make it, we're trying to publish the paper

basically. Okay, cool. Yeah, that's kind of like

taking time because, you know, they have work, I have, but

we still find time in the weekends to meet up and actually,

you know, work on it. But you can find me on

LinkedIn. You know, I post about my company

there. Almond. Right. Also have the websites, I don't

really use Instagram but I use Twitter. But I'm kind of like

a ghost on Twitter, you know, same. Yeah,

so I wouldn't want you to get my account on Twitter. But

yeah, you can, you can, you can find me on LinkedIn. And

yeah, once, once the work is ready, obviously I'm going

to, you know, make an announcement on LinkedIn. It's going to be published. You could,

you know, check it out. It's going to be open sourced on my GitHub and

yeah, it's just. That's where you can find it.

Yeah, it's great. That's awesome. Well,

thank you so much for joining us today. I really enjoyed it

and I think it's going to be very informative,

really, really informative about qkd. And that's a big deal.

It's important and people don't realize how important. And just

some of the infrastructure stuff you mentioned, whether it's credit score, like there's just the

best infrastructure is the one you don't really notice until it doesn't work.

And I think that key distribution is one of those. The

KD and qkd. Exactly. So, like, me

personally, like, my company is a fintech company, so we're more in the finance

section sector of the com. Of the country. And I actually did

research because. Okay. In my country, there's a

governing body called nibs, which

controls all the transactions that happen within all the

banks. Oh, interesting. Exactly. So I actually met with

most of the engineers because I have most of the engineers as friends because, you

know, we have a. We have a bank, so we have to use them and

all of that. So. Right. I actually met with a couple of them and,

you know, most of them aren't scared of the quantum computing era.

I haven't seen them make. They are mostly just focused on,

you know, current encryption techniques and how to further protect. How

to improve with the current encryption techniques.

This is my paper. But what I'm working on, like, the further I go,

right. If I'm able to get my hands on an actual

quantum computer or an actual quantum channel and

actually test this in real. In the. In real world and see how

it works and actually get it working, I could actually, you

know, integrate it into almond and we could foster that development

in Nigeria and Africa. That would be cool. That would be

cool. Well, awesome. I could talk to you

with me on the cryptography stuff and we'll let

the outro music play. Yeah. That was

awesome. That was great. Great. Thank you so much. I'm really happy we

made this happen. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely, man.

Cool.