BTQ Technologies and ITRI Complete First Milestone in Global QCIM Chip Roadmap

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BTQ Technologies Corp. (BTQ), a global technology company building the trust infrastructure for the quantum era, announced on August 7, 2026, the successful completion of the first milestone in its multi-year collaboration with the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) to validate BTQ’s Quantum Compute-in-Memory (QCIM) architecture for post-quantum cryptography.

The collaboration forms part of the global QCIM chip roadmap led by BTQ and ICTK Co., Ltd. (KOSDAQ: 456010). The program combines BTQ’s cryptographic architecture, ICTK’s secure semiconductor and physical unclonable function capabilities, and ITRI’s advanced semiconductor design, integration, and validation expertise.

Validation Results and Technical Scope

The completed milestone demonstrated the QCIM architecture’s ability to accurately and efficiently accelerate cryptographic operations under the demanding operating conditions evaluated during the program. The core IP executed operations associated with FIPS 203, FIPS 204, and FIPS 205, the post-quantum cryptography standards established by the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology to protect data against the code-breaking potential of future quantum computers. The results support the continued development of next-generation QCIM technology designed for future integration across military, industrial, automotive, Internet of Things, Physical AI, and other connected devices, systems, and infrastructure.

Key results from the first phase include:

• Validation of the QCIM core within a TSMC 28-nanometer design environment
• Demonstrated acceleration of cryptographic operations associated with FIPS 203, 204, and 205
• Confirmation of the functional correctness and feasibility of the QCIM architecture
• Demonstrated performance advantages and crypto-agility across multiple post-quantum algorithms
• Advancement of the program into its next phase of module-level integration, verification, and validation

“This milestone is an important technical and commercial step in the global QCIM roadmap being led by BTQ and ICTK,” said Olivier Roussy Newton, CEO and Chairman of BTQ Technologies. “The results demonstrate that the QCIM architecture can accurately and efficiently accelerate multiple NIST-standardized post-quantum cryptographic algorithms under demanding conditions while maintaining the flexibility required to respond to evolving security standards. As post-quantum security moves from standardization toward implementation, organizations will require hardware that can deliver stronger cryptographic protection without creating unacceptable performance, power or deployment constraints,” continued Roussy Newton. “The work completed with ITRI provides a stronger foundation for integrating QCIM into the devices and infrastructure supporting military, industrial, automotive, IoT and Physical AI systems.”

QCIM Architecture and Target Applications

QCIM is BTQ’s soft IP cryptographic accelerator, a licensable design block built to support both classical and post-quantum cryptographic functions in a compact, low-power footprint. By executing cryptographic operations inside the memory subsystem, the architecture is designed to reduce latency, power consumption, and data movement while remaining crypto-agile, meaning it can adapt as algorithms, standards, and customer security requirements evolve.

The next-generation QCIM quantum-security chip is being developed for use across IoT, AI devices, industrial systems, secure elements, edge devices, and other connected infrastructure where device authentication, security performance, and long-term cryptographic resilience are becoming increasingly important.

Next Phase and Path Toward Commercialization

The program now advances into module-level integration, verification, and validation. This phase is intended to evaluate how the QCIM core can be incorporated into broader system architectures while preserving functional correctness, interoperability, and performance.

“This milestone demonstrates meaningful progress in validating compute-in-memory architectures for post-quantum cryptography,” said Dr. Chih-Cheng Lu, Manager of ITRI’s Electronic and Optoelectronic System Research Laboratories. “The next phase will build on these results through module-level integration and verification, helping advance the architecture toward broader system implementation.”

ITRI, founded in 1973 and headquartered in Taiwan, is a world-leading R&D organization that has incubated hundreds of startups and spinoffs, including semiconductor companies UMC and TSMC.

For BTQ, completion of the first milestone represents a step from architectural development toward commercial evaluation. Independent validation of the core design reduces technical risk and provides a foundation for system-level integration, prospective customer demonstrations, and discussions with semiconductor, infrastructure, and device partners. Backed by ICTK’s secure chip capabilities and ITRI’s validation results, BTQ expects to ship test chips to key customers and strategic partners by year-end for performance and functional validation.

Subsequent fabrication, demonstration, and customer-evaluation activities will be assessed based on the results of the integration and verification program, foundry availability, prospective customer requirements, and broader commercial opportunities. These plans are forward-looking, and there can be no assurance they will be completed on the anticipated timeline or at all.

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