CryptoWorks21 and Quantum Information Technology Industry Day

Date and time: Oct 01, 2024, 10:30 am - 2:00 pm

Location: QNC 1201

Registration: To attend the event, please register here. Please note that space is limited.

Please join us for the CryptoWorks21 and Quantum Technology Industry Day -­‐ your opportunity to connect with industry partners to learn about employment opportunities within their organizations.

Representatives from cryptographic teams of Amazon, Crypto4A, evolutionQ and Scotiabank as well as representative of Quantum Technology partners from Anyon, softwareQ and Quantum Valley Ideas Lab each will provide a brief presentation on their organizations and current and upcoming hiring needs.

Presentations will be followed by an extended networking luncheon during which students and industry representatives will have the opportunity to meet and discuss job opportunities of mutual interest.

• Schedule:
• 10:15 – 10:30 a.m.
• Registration

• 10:30 – 10:45 a.m.
• Welcome and overview

• 10:45 a.m. – 12:00p.m.
• Ten-­‐minute presentations by each CrytpoWorks21 and IQC Industry Partners

• 12:00 p.m. – 2:00 p.m.
• Networking luncheon

Speakers:

• Dr. Donald Booth, Quantum Valley Ideas Lab. Donald is a lead scientist at Quantum Valley Ideas Lab, where he works on developing technologies such as Rydberg-atom based RF sensors to commercialization, as well as research toward these technologies. He holds a PhD in atomic physics from the University of Oklahoma, and has previous experience working on quantum information at the University of Wisconsin and in physics research at Argonne National Laboratory. He moved to Canada at the beginning of 2021, and has been at QVIL since then.
• Dr. Aaron Chow, Scotiabank. Aaron is currently Principal Cryptographer and Director of Cloud Security Engineering at Scotiabank, leading a diverse team to accelerate the build of transformational security services and advanced capabilities. As the Principal Cryptographer, he is also responsible for the Cryptography domain at Scotiabank providing cryptographic expertise and governance, and heads up the Crypto Council at the Bank. He is co-chair of the Canadian Financial Institution Quantum Working Group, and is also part of various industry quantum working groups. He is also faulty (part-time) at Georgian College and teaches cryptography. Academically, he was trained in mathematics, economics, and statistics, and holds a PhD in number theory from the University of Toronto.
• Dr. Vlad Gheorghiu, softwareQ Inc. Vlad is the CEO and President of softwareQ Inc., a quantum software and quantum information processing company in Waterloo, ON Canada. Vlad is also an Affiliate of the Institute for Quantum Computing at the University of Waterloo, ON Canada, working on quantum information and computation. Vlad holds a PhD in Theoretical Physics from Carnegie Mellon University, USA. His current interests lie in quantum software and quantum architectures, quantum-resistant cryptography, quantum error correction, quantum cryptanalysis and resource estimation for realistic implementations of quantum algorithms, entanglement theory, as well as applications of machine learning techniques to the quantum domain. Vlad has 20 years of experience in quantum information and computation, and more than 1600 citations in peer-reviewed articles.
• Dr. Jim Goodman, Crypto4A. Jim is a former Waterloo EE grad (‘94) who received his Masters (’96) and Ph.D. (’00) at MIT before embarking on a 20+ year career in the security/cryptography field working in both the private and public sectors for various companies and agencies. Currently Jim is the CTO and Principal Security Architect at Crypto4A, where he is responsible for all aspects of Crypto4A’s cryptographic implementations in both SW and HW. At the moment he is focused on the integration of, and migration to, PQC algorithms in Crypto4A’s product offerings.
• Brian Neill, evolutionQ. Brian has over 20 years of experience in commercial cybersecurity roles at organizations including Certicom, Blackberry, Infosec Global and evolutionQ with a primary focus on secure software application development and technical product management. Brian is a co-founder and Vice President of Product at evolutionQ, a quantum-safe technology company that builds cybersecurity software products and offers quantum risk assessment services to the financial, telecommunications and government sectors. Brian holds a part-time technical associate position with the University of Waterloo and works closely with the Open Quantum Safe project.
• Dr. Paul le Roux, Anyon Systems. Paul is the software team lead at Anyon Systems. He obtained his PhD in electronical engineering at Stellenbosch University in South Africa. He moved to Canada at the beginning of 2021 and has been working hard to bring quantum computing to end-users ever since.
• Prof. Douglas Stebila, University of Waterloo. Douglas Stebila is an Associate Professor of cryptography in the Department of Combinatorics & Optimization at the University of Waterloo. His research focuses on improving the security of Internet communications protocols and developing practical quantum-resistant cryptography. He is the co-founder of the Open Quantum Safe project, an open-source software project for prototyping and evaluating quantum-resistant cryptography.
• Dr. Amirhossein Vakili, Amazon. Amirhossein (Amir) is a senior software engineer in Amazon, where he is part of the AWS Cryptography organization. He develops and maintains cryptographic libraries that must meet AWS's compliance and performance requirements. His industrial experience prior to joining Amazon includes using Intel SGX and Arm TrustZone to safeguard user data, developing scanning tools to detect vulnerabilities in smart contracts, and formal analysis of proprietary cryptographic protocols. Amir has a PhD in Computer Science from University of Waterloo. His dissertation was focused on formal verification of concurrent systems.
• Dr. Sara Zafar Jafarzadeh, University of Waterloo. Sara is a cryptographer for the Synopsys Solutions Group and has been a post-doctoral fellow at the Institute for Quantum Computing at the University of Waterloo in Canada since 2020. She is currently leading the CryptoWorks21 program at UWaterloo. Sara has a decade of experience in quantum-safe cryptography and earned her Ph.D in quantum-safe cryptography under the supervision of Dr. Gilles Brassard from the University of Montreal in Canada. She holds her MSc in artificial intelligence and computer science.