In response to the Government of Canada’s release of the new Defence Industrial Strategy, Lisa Lambert, CEO, Quantum Industry Canada (QIC), released the following statement:
“Canada’s Defence Industrial Strategy marks a generational inflection point in how this country links security, sovereignty, and industrial capacity. This is not a routine defence update. It is a reset of how Canada intends to build power and prosperity.
By naming quantum computing, communications, and sensing among Canada’s sovereign capabilities, the government has sent a strong demand signal. The question now is whether that signal is reinforced through disciplined, sustained execution — at speed.
Quantum is not a niche science project. It’s a portfolio of advanced capabilities that will shape how Canada senses, secures, computes, and communicates — in defence and across the broader economy.
For example:
- Quantum sensing enables ultra-precise measurement that strengthens positioning, navigation, and timing; enhances detection and ISR; expands Arctic domain awareness from seabed to space; and improves monitoring of critical infrastructure.
- Quantum communications, networking, and quantum-resilient cryptography enable trusted information exchange, reinforce command-and-control, and protect defence systems and civilian infrastructure against both conventional and quantum-enabled cyber threats.
- Quantum computing delivers new computational power to accelerate materials discovery, optimize logistics, strengthen cybersecurity, enhance intelligence analysis, and support complex operational decision-making.
These technologies are inherently dual use. Many applications are defence-first, and they are being accelerated globally by allies and adversaries alike because of their potential to confer decisive operational advantage.
At the same time, Canada is advancing multiple long-lived defence procurements — submarines, surface combatants, Arctic surveillance systems, space assets, and secure communications infrastructure — that will remain in service for decades. These platforms will coexist with rapidly maturing quantum capabilities. Whether they are quantum-ready or quantum-enabled — and which vendors ultimately supply those capabilities — is being determined now, at the design stage, before vendor choices and supply chains lock in for a generation.
This creates a narrowing window to align platform requirements with Canada’s emerging quantum capabilities, reduce long-term operational and modernization risk, and embed sovereign industrial capacity and trusted supply chains into systems from day one.
The Strategy’s emphasis on a Build–Partner–Buy framework is therefore pivotal.
No single country will own all of quantum. But Canada can and should lead in value-chain nodes where we are globally competitive and where operational sovereignty demands it: build where feasible, anchoring IP, talent, and industrial capacity at home; partner with trusted allies to ensure interoperability and shared resilience; and buy in ways that reinforce — not erode — Canadian quantum capabilities.
Quantum will be an early proving ground for whether this framework is applied with intent, particularly in how Canada validates, procures from, and scales its high-performing SMEs.
When it comes to advanced technologies, Canada has often invented the future, only to watch others industrialize it. This Strategy creates a real opportunity to break that pattern. But potential alone will not scale companies, anchor supply chains, or embed sovereign capability in missions.
If Canadian quantum and enabling-technology firms — working alongside our country’s world-class research institutions and talent base — are validated through mission-driven pilots, scaled through procurement with clear pull-through, integrated into allied supply chains, and positioned for export growth, Canada can convert its early scientific leadership in quantum into enduring sovereign industrial capacity. If contracting tempo and cross-government alignment lag, the window will narrow more quickly.
Execution discipline and throughput will determine whether the Defence Industrial Strategy succeeds in delivering real capability to end-users while strengthening Canada’s domestic industrial base.
Done right, quantum can strengthen Canada’s security while anchoring a globally competitive, dual-use industry that drives exports, attracts capital, reinforces allied resilience, and secures long-term prosperity.
Canada’s quantum sector is ready to build, to partner, and to deliver.
Through Quantum Industry Canada, the sector is coordinated and prepared to help translate this Strategy into results — aligning requirements early, accelerating pilot-to-procurement pathways, and ensuring Canadian capabilities are embedded in the systems that will define our security and economic future.”
