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Quantum Research, Optimization (Intern/Contractor)

Job Description

Job Title: Quantum Research, Optimization (Intern/Contractor)

Department: R&D Innovation Lab

Duration: 6 months, Mai-Oct. (Flexible)

Supervisor: Heloise Pajot, Digital Innovation Lead

Location: Palo Alto, CA or remote (USA)

Schedule: Full time / Part-time (flexible)

Compensation: Paid, compensation commensurate based on qualifications and experience

About the company

EDF (Électricité de France) is a global, integrated energy company and the world’s largest electricity producer. With 140 GW of generation capacity across more than 30 countries, EDF generates over 650 TWh of electricity for 38 million customers, and 85% of that electricity has low or no carbon emissions. With 171,000 employees worldwide, EDF is active in the entire value chain of the electric industry, including R&D, project development, generation, trading, transmission, distribution, sales, and energy services.

In the US, EDF’s operations include EDF Renewables North America, EDF Energy North America, EDF R&D, and several smaller business units. EDF R&D has 1,800 researchers and 9 labs, including three in France, EDF Innovation Lab in the US, and others globally. Their role is to provide R&D, innovation, and business development support to the EDF Group. This is done through the creation of partnerships and collaborations with leading research institutions and industries and the identification and development of innovative technologies and solutions.

EDF is at the forefront of solving complex optimization and simulation problems in the Energy Industry. For over two decades, we have been operating our own High-Performance Computers (HPC) and developing numerous calculation codes to address these challenges. Given the growing scale and complexity of the energy industry, and to anticipate tomorrow’s challenges, EDF started exploring Quantum technologies in 2017. Today our quantum team gathers 20 researchers across France, Asia-Pacific, and the US working on several applications from quantum computing for optimization, simulation, and Quantum Machine Learning (QML) to quantum sensors and post-quantum cybersecurity. Given the early stage of quantum

technology, it’s uncommon for a utility company to invest such effort in quantum research. We’re proud to be among the leaders in quantum research for the energy industry.

About the role

We are currently seeking a talented and highly motivated Quantum Research Engineer Intern/Contractor to join our Digital Innovation team in Palo Alto, CA.

In this role, you will explore the potential applications of quantum technology in addressing a wide range of energy management problems. In this field, main challenges involve managing a stock of energy for production units (such as hydroelectric plants, batteries, or nuclear units) over a time horizon with constraints that can be efficiently modeled using a state graph. Such graph relies on a discretization of the horizon over discrete time periods. Vertices represent specific time steps and stock level, while arcs represent choices of production level, i.e stock consumption, during this time period. A path through the graph determines the energy management strategy for the unit over the horizon. Efficiently solving these models is of great importance to EDF.

Recent advancements in quantum operations research have demonstrated exponential quantum advantages for pathfinding on specific regular graphs, such as welded tree graphs [1] and regular sunflower graphs [2]. These studies achieve speed-ups by efficiently preparing a superposition of states over the vertices of the graph, a principle also considered by the EDF R&D Quantum team for outage planning [3]. This previous work highlighted the potential of quantum algorithms for energy management problems but requires extending the methodology to more generic graphs. The first step in this work will be to reproduce the results from the literature to gain a deep understanding of the methodology and confirm the quantum speed-up. Subsequently, we will study the potential extension to near-regular graphs, which could be practically applicable to energy management problems.

This position offers a unique opportunity to work at the cutting edge of quantum computing applications in the energy sector. You’ll have the autonomy to drive your research, publish and present high-impact results, and join a growing community of researchers exploring quantum solutions for the energy industry.

If you have a strong technical background, a passion for Quantum Computing, and an interest in the Energy Industry, apply now and join us in shaping the future of energy!

Qualifications:

• PhD level or currently pursuing a PhD degree in Mathematics (Optimization), Physics or a relevant field
• Strong background in quantum computing, mathematics, and algorithms
• Proficient coding skills in Python or relevant languages
• Experience with quantum programming languages and frameworks such as Qiskit, Cirq, or Q#
• Knowledge on graph optimization and/or problem complexity is preferred.
• Knowledge and experience in the energy industry is a plus.
• Ability to work independently with minimal supervision.
• Strong communication skills for collaborating with international teams and partners.

Key responsibilities:

• Assess the potential of quantum approaches to demonstrate speed up for path finding problems.
• Analyzing and verifying results obtained for pathfinding problems on specific graphs in the literature.
• Extending these methods to near regular graphs relevant to the energy management field.
• Model and implement approaches on refined use cases
• Understand and apply relevant quantum code libraries
• Perform test on Quantum machines.
• Collaborate with partners in France and in the US.

All of these tasks will be related to the work already carried out by EDF in previous years. The person may perform other duties assigned.

How to Apply:

• Send your Resume to heloise.pajot@edf-inc.com with ‘Application – Quantum Research, Optimization (Intern/Contractor)’ in the subject line. Please add your availabilities and motivations in your email.

EDF Inc. is an Equal Opportunity Employer, and all qualified candidates will receive consideration for all positions without regard to race, color, age, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, veteran status, disability, genetic information, or any other characteristic protect

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Bibliography :

Jianqiang Li and Sebastian Zur. Multidimensional electrical networks and their application to exponential speedups for graph problems. arXiv preprint arXiv:2311.07372, 2023.

[1] Jianqiang Li. Exponential speedup of quantum algorithms for the pathfinding problem. arXiv preprint arXiv:2307.12492, 2023. arXiv: 2307.12492 [2] Jianqiang Li, Yu Tong, 2024, Exponential Quantum Advantage for Pathfinding in Regular Sunflower Graph, arXiv:2407.14398 [3] R Griset, I Lavdas, JG Jarkovsky, 2024 State-space reduction techniques exploiting specific constraints for quantum search Application to a specific job scheduling problem, arXiv preprint arXiv:2501.0717

[VIE] Open Innovation Analyst

Employer	EDF Inc. Innovation Lab
Reports To	Olivier Deneux, Innovation and Energy Markets Director
Location	EDF Innovation Lab, Palo Alto, CA
Position Open	From June 2025 (France) for a start in the US in July 2025
Type	VIE, see requirements in term of age and citizenship here

Company and department overview

EDF (Électricité de France) is a global, integrated energy company and the world’s largest electricity producer. With 140 GW of generation capacity across more than 30 countries, EDF generates over 650 TWh of electricity for 38 million customers, and 85% of that electricity has low or no carbon emissions. With 160,000 employees worldwide, EDF is active in the entire value chain of the electric industry, including R&D, project development, generation, trading, transmission, distribution, sales, and energy services. In the US, EDF’s operations include EDF Renewables, EDF Trading & Energy Services, Dalkia, Framatome, EDF R&D, and several smaller business units.

EDF R&D has 1,900 researchers and 8 labs, including three in France, EDF Innovation Lab in the US, and others globally. Their role is to provide research, innovation and related support to the business entities of EDF Group. This is done through the creation of partnerships and collaborations with leading research institutions and industries, and the identification and development of innovative technologies and solutions. EDF Innovation Lab also introduces start-ups and new trends and emerging technologies to EDF Group’s business units with the goal to partner and/or develop joint ventures.

Summary of the position

Under a VIE contract, the US Innovation team is looking for an Open Innovation Analyst to support its activities. The Open Innovation initiative focuses on accelerating innovation within EDF Group’s business units by collaborating with external partners (startups, corporations, and academic institutions) to develop new solutions that address specific needs or challenges.

As an Open Innovation Analyst, the VIE will study emerging trends and technologies, assess the innovation landscape, and analyze their potential impact on EDF’s business units. This work could ultimately lead to startup or solution scouting and the development of pilot projects with a business unit. The range of topics is broad and closely aligned with EDF’s activities in carbon-free power generation, retail, and decarbonization solutions.

In addition to the broader Open Innovation role, the Analyst will have a strong focus on Customer Solutions. Innovative solutions, technologies, and business models could support advancements in new offerings, flexibility solutions, customer relationships, digital experiences, and applications for both B2B and B2C customers. This includes developments in smart homes and connected customer ecosystems. The Open Innovation Analyst will explore these topics and provide deep dives to support and inspire EDF Commerce in France.

The future VIE employee will be part of the Open Innovation team. They will assist the Innovation Director in developing the Innovation Lab network, participate in industry and innovation events for Energy and Climate Tech located in the United States to identify key trends and ecosystems, and help promote the US Innovation Lab as a leading player in Climate and Carbon-Free Tech in the Bay Area.

Duties and responsibilities

• Contribute to trend analysis and in-depth studies on emerging businesses and technologies related to the energy sector, from carbon-free energy generation to retail. Scout innovative tecnologies to provide landscapes of startups and innovative solutions.
• Conduct studies on Customer Solutions, delivering reports and presentations to the R&D teams and informing EDF Commerce and other BUs in France.
• Attend industry events to connect with industry leaders and identify and report on key innovation trends for the team.
• Support the EDF Innovation Lab with reporting, communications, workshops, and presentations, helping to strengthen its impact within the CleanTech/ClimateTech ecosystem in the Bay Area.

Qualifications

Education and experience

• Degree in Engineering or Business, with some experience in one or several of the following areas: Climate Tech, Carbon-Free energy system, Innovation, Venture Capital, Marketing, Customer Solutions.
• Experience with relevant industries, electric utilities, startups

Professional skills

• Capable of multi-tasking and learning new areas
• Ability to structure and deliver analyses and presentations with minimal supervision
• Ability to work in a multicultural environment
• Strong verbal and written English communication skills
• Foreign company experience appreciated
• Experience in R&D, innovation and emerging concepts
• Able to travel nationally and internationally, based on client and business needs

 

Who We’re Looking For

We are looking for a curious, analytical, and entrepreneurial-minded individual with a strong interest in energy, innovation, and emerging technologies. This role offers a unique opportunity to collaborate with influential leaders in the Climate Tech space, explore cutting-edge solutions, work in an international environment, and contribute to EDF’s innovation strategy.

EDF Inc. is an Equal Opportunity Employer and all qualified candidates will receive consideration for all positions without regard to race, color, age, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, veteran status, disability, genetic information, or any other characteristic protected by law.

For more information or to apply, contact Olivier Deneux.

Disclaimer

• May perform other duties assigned