Australian Quantum Sensor Company Raises Seed Funding
Deteqt, an Australian deep tech company building one of the world's most compact quantum magnetic sensors, has closed a A$5 million ($3.6 million) seed round led by Main Sequence, with participation from ATP Fund, BOKA Capital, Beaten Zone Venture Partners, Uniseed, and the University of Sydney.
Deteqt's breakthrough is a chip-scale quantum magnetometer: an exquisitely sensitive sensor that combines a diamond crystal with a custom semiconductor chip, compact enough to be embedded in drones, autonomous vehicles and robots.
“Our technology uses engineered diamond to measure magnetic fields with extremely high sensitivity,” said Dr Jim Rabeau, CEO and co-founder of Deteqt. “The diamond contains atomic-scale quantum defects that respond to magnetic fields. When illuminated with laser light, they emit an optical signal that changes depending on the surrounding magnetic environment, allowing the system to measure magnetic fields precisely. Deteqt’s focus is on integrating this capability into a compact semiconductor platform suitable for scalable manufacturing.”
Rabeau says magnetic fields permeate every object, every geological formation, every living body. "When we have been able to access these signals at all, the results have been profound - MRI, mineral exploration, brain imaging. But these are isolated breakthroughs, built on systems too large and expensive to deploy beyond a handful of controlled environments. Our chip-scale integration changes that entirely.”
Deteqt's lead application is GPS-denied navigation for defence platforms, where jamming in contested environments has created urgent, immediate demand for alternative positioning technology.
Marine and subsea environments are an important focus area for Deteqt, particularly for navigation and magnetic anomaly detection. Because GPS signals do not penetrate underwater, alternative navigation approaches are needed for subsea systems. Magnetic sensing also has potential applications in detecting large metallic objects such as submarines, pipelines, and unexploded ordnance.
“Our focus is on developing compact, chip-scale quantum magnetometers that could eventually be deployed in arrays across marine platforms and distributed sensing networks,” says Rabeau.
Temperature stability and operation in noisy environments are important engineering considerations for the platform. Earlier this year, the company completed a field test in an unshielded environment above an active rail corridor with significant vibration and electromagnetic interference. A prototype device successfully detected magnetic signatures from passing trains. These tests are helping guide the next stage of robustness and systems engineering.
Magnetic interference is a challenge for any magnetic sensing system, but Rabeau says that one advantage of his chip-scale approach is that it enables compact sensor arrays. Arrays allow signal processing techniques that can help characterise background magnetic effects from the host platform while improving sensitivity to external signals.
“Our long-term vision is not just individual sensors, but networks of sensors operating together. Reducing the size and power requirements of quantum magnetic sensing creates the possibility of deploying sensing systems more broadly across vehicles, infrastructure, and distributed environments.”
The seed funding will be deployed to advance Deteqt's field-ready quantum magnetometer toward first commercial deployments and to grow the team to meet accelerating partner demand across Australia and globally.
