From Lab to Prototypes: Company-Building at a Photonic Quantum Technology Startup

A three-and-a-half-year-old deep tech startup had built a promising photonic base technology and was working on two applications in quantum sensing. Now it wanted to attack two additional applications — a third quantum sensor and a first product in quantum computing. The company was a spin-off from a larger enterprise in a different industry segment, founded to expand the parent’s business into new technological areas — which meant high expectations and ambitious targets from day one.

The team consisted of scientists, fresh graduates from university and a few experienced engineers. The organisation had limited experience in bringing base technologies from experimental proof of concept (Technology Readiness Level 3 (TRL)) to demonstrate the technology in the relevant environment (TRL 6) and further to system prototype demonstration in operational environment (TRL 7) and above.

Major capabilities were simply missing. The company had no capability in electronic circuit design and manufacturing, none in digital circuit design, and very little in photonic integrated circuit design, manufacturing, packaging and characterisation. The lab and test infrastructure were at an early stage.

Capacity was stretched very thin against the startup’s ambitious targets. Four product lines, missing core capabilities, lack of infrastructure, and a team built for science rather than engineering — ambition and ability had drifted apart.

The company-building programme treated talent, the engineering system, and the operating model as one integrated build rather than sequential ones. The guiding question for every decision: what must this company own - and what can it borrow, buy, or partner for?

Building Block 1 - Focus & Partnering: Core and non-core capabilities were explicitly decided. All non-core and capital-intensive capabilities - photonic integrated circuit manufacturing, electronic circuit design and manufacturing - were sourced through partnerships rather than built in-house, preserving capital and management attention for the differentiating photonic core.

Building Block 2 - Talent & Capability Building: Engineering capacity constraints were debottlenecked by bringing in experienced freelancers from agencies, while key engineering personnel were hired aggressively through agencies and employees' personal networks. Capability building was institutionalised: work was standardised, fresh graduates were systematically educated, and engineering standards were set.

Building Block 3 - Systems Engineering & Stage-Gate: Systems engineering was introduced as a core capability - capturing requirements, performing architecture design and planning, and conducting verification and validation. A lightweight, cross-functional stage-gate process gave the maturing product lines structure without burying a startup in bureaucracy.

Building Block 4 - Operating Model: An Objectives and Key Results (OKR) system combined with annual and quarterly planning and review cycles and scrum-like execution connected strategy to weekly work. A project-function operating model with distinct operating modes - dependent on urgency and the degree of required cross-functional collaboration - and WIP limits on functional kanban boards kept the product line flowing through one organisation.

The four building blocks were erected in parallel, with the partner network treated as a design principle of the company rather than a stopgap: the startup would own the photonic core and orchestrate the rest.

Over the three and a half years of the programme, company valuation grew tenfold, and the company secured Series A financing for the next iterations in the photonic computing segment - investors funding the next product generation on the strength of demonstrated delivery.

The delivery record turned with it:

Product Delivery: New prototypes were showcased every year at major trade shows for two sensors and in the computing area. A functional model of the third sensor was delivered to a space agency for test.

IP & Recognition: More than 70 patents were filed, several world-first innovations were demonstrated, and the company received a prestigious innovation award.

Capabilities & Partnerships: Major engineering and operations capabilities were established in-house, and several collaboration agreements were closed with electronic design and manufacturing service companies and photonic circuit production companies - a partner network that limits capital expenditure on the balance sheet.

The growth path tracks the build-up: a young spin-off with a stretched team became a venture-backed company delivering reliable prototypes into target operating environments.

Beyond the numbers, the organisation had shifted. Systems engineering, stage-gate discipline, OKRs, and the project-function operating model replaced improvised heroics. A science-based start-up had become a product company - operating on a capability base it deliberately chose to own, with partners for everything else.