November 11, 2026 -- A German deep-tech company, a Dutch region with ambition and a handshake at the Netherlands Pavilion in Munich: today Q.ANT, Innovally and Horizon Flevoland celebrated their Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) at SEMICON Europa. Together, the partners will develop, test and scale concrete applications of photonic computing in and from Almere and Flevoland.

The idea behind it: AI needs ever more computing power, and with it ever more energy. Q.ANT offers a new route. Its photonic processors compute with light instead of electrons. They work as co-processors alongside existing CPUs and GPUs in the data centre, need far less energy and help make AI models leaner.

Each partner brings its own strengths. Q.ANT contributes its technology and expertise and leads the technical objectives of the pilots. Innovally, the innovation platform behind High Tech Almere, and Horizon Flevoland, the province’s regional development agency, open doors to end users, partners, talent and funding opportunities in the region. A joint roadmap for the next 12 to 18 months sets the course: use cases, pilots and demonstrators in digital infrastructure, logistics, healthcare and the public sector, commercialisation and talent.

The partnership began with Q.ANT’s visit to Almere in July. Four months later, high-ranking guests underlined its weight: Michiel Sweers, Director-General for Foreign Economic Relations at the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Toon van Dijk, Regional Minister for Economic Affairs of the Province of Flevoland, and Eric-Mark Huitema, CEO of High Tech NL, spoke alongside Michael Förtsch, CEO of Q.ANT.

“Europe needs its own energy-efficient AI infrastructure, and it will not catch up in conventional processors. But the next category, computing with light, is still open,” says Michael Förtsch. “Who owns this category, and with it the market, will not be decided in the lab, but by users who put it to work. Almere and Flevoland connect us with exactly those users.”

Q.ANT sees the cooperation as a long-term commitment and brings its research, technology and commercial work into it. The next step: turning the roadmap into the first pilots.