Aalto has world-class quantum research, quantum computers a bike ride away, and a company that grew out of its own labs. What it doesn't have is a front door. We're building one.
Right now a first-year has no idea how to get near a lab, research groups struggle to explain what they actually work on, and companies can't find the students they'll need in five years. Everyone is inside the same square kilometre of Otaniemi and nobody is talking.
Our job is to be the connective tissue — and to make the Finnish quantum ecosystem stronger as a whole, not just the student end of it.
Make Aalto — and Finland — the place to be for quantum.
Connect students, researchers and companies into one quantum community that benefits the whole Finnish ecosystem.
Get students genuinely excited about research and the impact it has.
Empower students to actually get involved — through projects, guidance and real opportunities.
Six things, roughly in the order we can realistically pull them off.
Events with a genuinely low threshold — hangouts, talks, panels, a kick-off. You don't need to know what a qubit is to walk in, and there's a channel where people actually post.
Work that moves a CV forward. Open assignments from research groups, company briefs, hackathons, and side projects nobody has to sign off on.
A plain-language map of what every quantum group on campus actually does, plus mentorship, so finding the right door stops being a matter of who you happen to know.
Direct lines to the companies building this stuff. They want the talent early; students want the context. Nobody has strung the wire yet.
Somewhere to physically build, in the spirit of ETH's robotics workshop. Software is the easy on-ramp. Hardware is what makes it real.
Longer term: a conference that puts researchers and companies in one room, and a student quantum incubator. Finland has already proven a lab in Otaniemi can become a company.
A way in. Events you can attend cold, projects worth putting your name on, mentors who'll tell you straight which course is worth taking. No prior quantum required — CS, physics, maths and electrical engineering all belong here.
Motivated students who can carry a side project, momentum toward publications and new collaborators, and a channel to explain your group's work to exactly the people who might one day join it.
Early access to the students who'll build your next decade, briefs that get genuinely worked on, and an honest read on what the Finnish quantum ecosystem is still missing. Tell us what's lacking and we'll go build it.
We're becoming an AYY association and talking to students, professors, other associations and companies before we lock anything in. If you have an opinion about what this should be, now is the moment it's cheapest to change our minds.
Registering as an association, setting up the Telegram group, and interviewing people across campus: if a quantum association existed, what would you actually want from it?
First contact with the new intake. A booth in Otaniemi, patches, stickers, quantum games and a pitch that doesn't waste anyone's time.
A guest from the quantum industry, a panel discussion, and a room full of people who didn't know each other that morning.
Then the harder things: a hardware space, a student incubator, and an event that gets Otaniemi noticed from the outside.
We'll be at a booth with patches, stickers, snacks and a couple of games that are more fun than they sound. Bring nothing, know nothing, ask anything.
You don't need a quantum background. You need to be interested and willing to show up. That's the entire bar.