On November 19th and 20th the inaugural Southwest Quantum Technologies group kick-off meeting was held at the University of Exeter; over 50 participants from the GW4 universities (Bath, Bristol, Cardiff, Exeter and beyond) attended, including the keynote speaker Prof. Philippe Grangier from Institut d'Optique in Paris.

The goal of the SWQT is to bring together the quantum expertise in the GW4 that may not normally get a chance to interact, foster collaboration, and ultimately strengthen the quantum community, leading to more resources for quantum technology research and innovation in the southwest. John Rarity, Jonathan Matthews, David Tew and Peter Turner gave presentations on quantum research in Bristol, and we saw a good sample of what is going on in the rest of the GW4.  We also had a presentation from Toshiba's Anthony Bennett, and Sir Peter Knight and Derek Gillespie from EPSRC spoke about quantum technologies in the UK more broadly.

There is a follow-up meeting in Bristol February 2nd and 3rd -- please save the dates!