Oxford
Quantum
Circuits

Ultimately, Ilana makes sure that OQC remains at the forefront of the quantum revolution. Thanks to her academic background, having gained a PhD in quantum physics from Royal Holloway, University of London, where she spent most of her PhD as a student in industry at the National Physical Laboratory, Teddington, she’s also providing technical input in the design of our quantum computer.

Ilana’s ambitions can be summed up in a single word that comes up a lot in a conversation with her: impact. Not just in the fledging quantum computing industry, but in the world writ. She believes in pushing the boundaries and doing things that have never been done before, thanks to quantum computing.

Ilana takes pride in breaking grounds on multiple levels: as a pioneer in quantum physics and as an executive woman in tech. When she’s not roadmapping, speaking at an event, reporting to the Board, pitching investors, hiring more ninjas or giving interviews, you might find her playing the piano, enjoying live music nights or boxing at the gym.

After the completion of his BSc degree in Civil Engineering from the American University in Dubai, Tawfik joined a construction design consultants company located in Dubai and worked with them as a Civil Project Engineer for 2+ years, where he assisted the site team in supervising the execution of different residential projects in terms of cost, time and quality.

Tawfik completed his MSc in Construction Project Management from Birmingham City University with a thesis focusing on the role of BIM technology in improving communication and information exchange compared to the current project management practices. Thus, he joined OQC because he believes in the power of new technologies to enhance some of the world's current practices, not only from project management perspective, but also in terms of sustainability and environmental solutions.

In his spare time he loves visiting and exploring new places, especially the ones with rich history and architectural engineering masterpieces. He also enjoy sports, specifically football and bodybuilding.

Kowsar studied for her PhD as a Marie Curie early stage researcher in University of Leeds. Her work was on magnetic thin films suitable for new generation of data storage, and focused on domain wall dynamics in Co/Pt multilayers. Hence, she got skilled in different thin film deposition systems and various characterisation techniques. She also has prior experience of working on organic solar cells and Co/Pd thin films.

Outside the lab, Kowsar loves enjoying nature, taking long walks (listening to a podcast) and maybe going climbing from time to time. She also enjoys reading Persian poems as a way to relax.

Marco is an Aeronautical Engineer, and prior to joining OQC he has worked in different industries in diverse countries as a Project Engineer. He gained experience in problem solving and design applying new technologies to improve production processes.

Marco grew up in Argentina, and outside the office he enjoys riding horses and running. He also likes outdoor sports, such as diving and motocross.

Prior to joining OQC, Connor worked at the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) where he was the lead researcher for the Superconducting Electronics team and worked on the development of Josephson Travelling Wave Parametric Amplifiers (JTWPAs) and research into the physics of superconducting nanobridges as Josephson elements, as well as dipping his toes into quantum metrology.

Connor received his PhD in physics from Royal Holloway, University of London in 2014 for work on the detection of thermoelectric effects in superconductors using a Hybrid Quantum Interference Device (HyQUID) as the read-out detector. He also developed a novel implementation of the HyQUID for use as a latching quantum read-out.

Connor is a member of the Institute of Physics, and has held Chartered Physicist status since 2017.

Outside of the laboratory he enjoys being outdoors - particularly multi-day hiking, as well as running (extremely slowly) through forests.

Chris is a multi-skilled technician who has worked in a number of different industries. He has a lot of practical hands-on experience working with anything from CNC sheet metal machinery, to electronic rework and repair. Chris will use his experience to assist the quantum hardware team in overcoming practical problems.

Chris enjoys working on old motor cars, playing the drums, and fixing / operating old machinery in his spare time.

Prior to joining OQC, Anne-Claire was Director of Strategic Partnerships at what3words, another groundbreaking tech startup. Previously she had led the work of a United Nations’ agency on environmental and social sustainability; and helped established the corporate social responsibility program of the French national lottery. She also worked as a consultant to multiple CAC40 companies to address their technological gaps.

Anne-Claire holds a Masters degree in International Relations from La Sorbonne, Paris and a Law degree (LLB) from Rennes University (France). She also attended Harvard Extension School’s Business Communications curriculum. She’s a keen sailor and skier.

Narendra completed his PhD in physics from Temple University Philadelphia, USA where he focused on the development of superconductingTHz receivers for NASA, Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Before joining OQC, Narendra was a post-doctoral research fellow at Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden where he developed novel MgB2 superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors. His interests include superconducting quantum technology, quantum education outreach activities for underrepresented communities in science.

Originally from the foothills of the Himalayas, Narendra loves trekking, and he reads books and writes poems in his native language.

As a Software Engineer, Kajsa is responsible for a number of quantum and development infrastructure projects around quantum chip simulation and data management systems.

Kajsa holds an M.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from Lund University (Sweden) and a dual M.Sc. in Space Instrumentation and Technology from Université Paul Sabatier (France) and Luleå University of Technology (Sweden). Originally from Sweden, Kajsa loves the outdoors and takes any opportunity for alpine skiing. When there's no place to ski, she is quite content going for a hike or building a camp in some remote forest. This is fortunate as Oxfordshire doesn't have any mountains and seldom any snow.

From there she joined OQC as a quantum engineer, working in the quantum hardware team to run qubit measurements and develop our unique superconducting qubit technology.

Prior to joining OQC Norbert worked on several integrated development environments as a software engineer, getting familiar with multiple areas of software development, like automated tests, build automation, compilers and UI.

Norbert received a Master’s degree in Computer Science from the ENS Lyon (France). Besides his professional experience, he also got involved in several research projects in academia. Most of the time, he worked closely with FPGAs, for example studying floorplanning algorithms, high level synthesis, or designing several applications.

Norbert loves to travel and visit new places, either as a vacation or for work, so moving to the UK from Romania was an exciting adventure. When he is not exploring, Norbert reads and watches movies, preferably science fiction or fantasy themed ones.

Prior to joining OQC, Jonathan worked as a Senior Research Scientist and Measurement Fellow at the National Physical Laboratory (NPL). While there, he led research on the metrology of superconducting qubits focusing on the metrology and statistics for reliable reporting of qubit parameters. Before this, Jonathan was a PDRA/Quantum Engineer at the Wallenberg Centre for Quantum Technology (WaCQT) at Chalmers University in Sweden where he focused on understanding decoherence in superconducting qubits and nanowire superinductors. He has also worked as a PDRA at the London Centre for Nanotechnology (LCN) at UCL, where he worked on novel focused-ion-beam techniques as a means of realising low-dissipation nanowire circuits.

In 2014, Jonathan received a PhD in Physics from Royal Holloway University of London (RHUL). For his PhD, Jonathan worked between NPL and RHUL to develop new readout methods for superconducting resonators based upon frequency-metrology techniques.

Outside of the lab, Jonathan enjoys walking his dog and homebaking.

Before joining OQC, Natasha spent over 6 years working in operations and administration for a specialised Technology and Engineering recruitment agency where she has been able to develop knowledge and experience across a wide range of functions.

Outside of the office, Natasha enjoys exercising at the gym, travelling and exploring new places around the world, and being a massive food lover, trying all the different cuisines that come along with this!

Richard is a Chartered Mechanical Engineer and has a wealth of experience delivering complex projects into production from small teams to large scale assembly lines at various international locations. In addition, he has worked within the areas of Supplier Quality, Lean Manufacturing and Manufacturing Engineering. He was elected a Fellow of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers in 2013.

Richard enjoys an active family life, as well as running, hiking and caring for his beloved Land Rover Defender. Also enjoying watching Rugby and Motorsport with friends when time permits.

Prior to joining OQC, Shaun received no corrections on his PhD in quantum physics from Royal Holloway, University of London and, joined the National Physical
Laboratory. His work was in developing a novel near-field scanning microwave microscope designed to investigate atomic-scale defects in superconducting quantum technologies.

In the past, Shaun has also worked as a software engineer in Manchester where he received a Master's from the University of Manchester.

In his spare time, he enjoys bouldering and attending CrossFit classes.

Prior to joining OQC, Yashwanth received his PhD in Electrical Engineering from University of Leuven and IMEC in Belgium, where he worked on the development of 2D materials based tunnelling transistors for future electronic applications. He specialises in evaluating device performance and integration of novel materials for future CMOS technology. His current research interests include Quantum based Semiconductor and Superconductor technologies.

Outside of the office, Yashwanth plays the keyboard and composes music in Indian and contemporary genres. He also enjoys going to the gym and loves spending his off-days doing long hikes.

Prior to joining OQC, Peter worked for multi-national, blue-chip organisations including ARM, Imagination Technologies and Ensilica and has led multiple COTS products from the ground up, including an ATX motherboard and an extended temperature, rugged SATA controller.

Peter has contributed in the development of multiple large scale, SOC products including a spectrography based gas detector, fingerprint recognition system and a radar-based, MIMO system for autonomous vehicles. Peter has also designed various IP products from the ground up, including a novel, power-aware SPI controller, an I2C controller, a memory controller and a parametrically scalable IIR filter.

Peter has a range of extracurricular qualifications in FPGA design, verification and RF engineering. In his spare time, Peter enjoys rock-climbing and producing music.

Gioele joined OQC as quantum engineer and is working with the quantum hardware team on advancing the capabilities of current quantum processing units.

Originally from Italy, in his spare time Gioele enjoys experimenting new cuisines (both by cooking and eating!), going for walks in the London parks and spending time with his friends and with his inseparable cat Gina.

Before joining OQC, Nicki spent the last few years working in children’s social care, supporting young adults who had previously been looked after; offering advice and support to develop their independent skills and help them successfully transition into adulthood.

Outside of the office, you can find Nicki at a coffee shop; walking her dog or redecorating her first home.

Owen worked as part of a software consultancy for 14 years prior to joining OQC. For more than a decade, Owen has built and managed scientific software as part of international collaborations. Most recently, Owen has worked with the European Spallation Source under construction in Sweden.

When not looking after his young children, Owen can be found building and riding bikes.

As a budding professional physicist Chris is excited for the opportunity to be working at the forefront of quantum computing technology and hopes to grow as a researcher along with the new and exciting industry of quantum technologies.

Originally from the Isle of Man, Chris enjoys cooking, dancing (whether he is any good at it is subjective but he definitely enjoys it) and playing the guitar. He is also an avid rock climber, adding yet another climber to the OQC team.

Bryn has worked for 10 years as an academic researcher specialising in experimental quantum optics and quantum information science. He received his PhD from the University of Bristol, working on optical quantum computing with fibre-optic sources of entangled photons, before going on to postdoctoral positions at the University of Sydney and Oxford University, working on single photon sources, frequency converters, and circuits based on silicon photonic chips. Immediately prior to joining OQC Bryn held a Marie Skłodowska Curie fellowship at Imperial College London.

In his spare time, Bryn occasionally enjoys guitars, painting, and the gym, but more often good food, watching films, and his cat.

In his off time he runs various TTRPG games and plays piano (badly, for now).

Prior to joining OQC, Waqas had a purely RF background. He worked on a number of projects; which included two with the European Space Agency (developing a Ka-band ground terminal communication system for tracking LEO & MEO satellites and a Ka-band communication system for automotive vehicles) and a project with McLaren (developing a 5G communication system for car & rail networks).

Waqas has a BEng (Hons) in Electronic Engineering and a PhD in RF & Electromagnetics — both from the University of Westminster in London. He and his research group also contributed to developing techniques for using Graphene as an RF switch. During his PhD, he gained first-hand knowledge of the design, fabrication and test of antennas and filters — and many life skills and experiences.

Outside work, Waqas enjoys a wide range of activities. These span from indoor ones (reading, violin and building things) to outdoors ones (travelling and most outdoor sports). He aims to be a violinist and a tennis ace one day — and daydreams playing in Wimbledon finals.

He then went onto a postdoc at UC Berkeley, working on methodologies for nuclear spin hyperpolarisation. During this time he gained skills in instrument control and anticrossing physics between nuclear and electron spins. His postdoc in Berkeley included engineering of RF transmission lines and significant amounts of RF pulse engineering using AWGs. During this time he also worked on his own python framework to simulate the quantum mechanics of nuclear-electron spin interactions.

Then slightly shifting fields, he did another postdoc at the University of Cologne in the area of cQED on topological insulators towards Majorana quantum computing. Rich began at the start of a new venture into cQED in this lab, so had significant exposure to RF engineering for Transmon qubits from the ground up. He also worked heavily on design, simulation, fabrication and measurement of various iterations of superconducting CPW resonators. This included DC/RF hybrid devices as well as high magnetic field compatible designs. Throughout this experience he developed his own python package for mask generation of superconducting CPW designs with Andreev qubits.

In his spare time Richard is bouldering, multi-day hiking or reading.

Mya loves animals, nature and dancing. In her spare time she learns about the world of metaphysics and enjoys designing and creating crystal jewellery for healing purposes. Mya is also regularly involved in volunteering with charities.

Prior to joining OQC Andrew had spent the past 4 years gaining an MSc in political science, while also working as a scuba diving instructor; managing projects in and around a dive centre/site in the UK.

Outside of OQC, Andrew has been involved in MMA and rugby for a number of years, but they have more recently turned their hand to producing and sharing music online as a singer and (beginner) guitar player.

Prior to joining OQC, Gavin completed his PhD in Quantum Technology jointly between UCL's London Centre for Nanotechnology and the National Physical Laboratory (NPL). His research focused mainly on using superconducting resonators to measure coherence properties of electron spin resonance transitions in rare-earth doped crystals, with his experience in fabrication, cryogenics, and superconducting devices. More recently he has been designing and simulating RF devices to improve the sensitivity of lateral flow tests.

When not dealing with quantum hardware, Gavin's hobbies include hiking, home-brewing, and hoarding board games.

Before joining OQC Tom has worked at both startups and large enterprise companies, building and improving platforms, web applications and APIs. More recently adopting modern DevOps methods to automate cloud infrastructure build and software integration/delivery.

Outside of work Tom brews beer in his garden, plays the drums and likes to run occasionally.

This is an unexpected and incommensurate loss. We miss him, his kindness, his wit and his work ethics deeply, and he will be forever remembered.

Phil had joined OQC in July 2018, when it was only three of us. Phil was more than just OQC’s VP Software; he was an incredible team leader, mentor and friend. He was immensely proud of his team and work at OQC, and we will endeavour to make Phil proud in everything we do.

To celebrate his achievements and honour his memory we are supporting Phil’s chosen charities: the Brompton Fountain and Julia’s House, dedicated to the well being of children and their families.
https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/philrsmith
https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/philrsmith2