At its Digital Skills EU Days in Brussels on June 30, 2026, the European Commission launched three skills academies, for quantum technologies, artificial intelligence, and virtual worlds. The Commission said the academies are funded under the Digital Europe Programme.
The European Health and Digital Executive Agency (HaDEA) named the European Quantum Academy (EQA) as the project selected for the Quantum Skills Digital Academy. The Quantum Flagship, the EU’s research initiative for quantum technologies, had announced the EQA’s launch in May.
The academy has €19.8 million in funding and a target of training at least 600 people in master’s- and doctoral-level programs by the end of the project, according to the Flagship.
Disclosure: Quantum Observer’s Editor-in-Chief Marin Ivezic is the founder of and an instructor at Quantum Academy, a quantum education and training provider that is separate from the European Quantum Academy.
Funding and partners
The Flagship said the EQA “will act as Europe’s coordinating body for quantum technology education.” It said the academy brings together more than 70 partner institutions and over 100 affiliated organizations. Jacob Sherson, director of the European Quantum Readiness Center at Aarhus University in Denmark, coordinates the academy.
The EU’s contribution to the academy is €9.9 million, according to HaDEA, which had signed the grant agreement by June 8. Trinity College Dublin, one of the partners, said that Ireland’s involvement is co-funded by the EU through the Digital Europe Programme and by the Government of Ireland.
The University of Helsinki said that InstituteQ, represented in the project by the university, had joined the academy as of May 1. The university called the academy “a Digital Europe Programme project.”
The Commission had announced in April 2025 that it was setting up the three academies, to be funded under the Digital Europe Work Programme 2025–2027. It said then that the academies would promote digital careers, especially among women, and encourage European talent working abroad to return.
Structure and targets
The EQA will operate through six Regional Quantum Academies “spanning Northern, Western, Southern, Eastern and Iberian Europe,” the Flagship said. The academy will coordinate education from school outreach and bachelor’s and master’s programs through doctoral training to professional upskilling and lifelong learning.
ICFO, the Institute of Photonic Sciences, said it would coordinate the regional academy for Spain and Portugal, with 10 participating institutions. ICFO calls it the South-Western Europe Regional Quantum Academy, for the region the Flagship lists as Iberian Europe.
The Flagship listed three targets. The academy aims to train “at least 600 quantum professionals through EQF level 7 and level 8 programmes by the end of the project.” It also aims to deliver training to 5,000 learners and to reserve 20% of student travel grants for learners from underrepresented groups.
Levels 7 and 8 of the European Qualifications Framework (EQF) correspond to master’s and doctoral degrees. The University of Helsinki described the EQA as a four-year project. The Flagship said the academy would support the workforce the sector needs “over the next four years as quantum computing, sensing and communications move from the laboratory to the market.”
The EQA consolidates four earlier Quantum Flagship projects, QTEdu, DigiQ, QTIndu, and QUCATS. According to the Flagship, the teams behind those projects established a shared European Competence Framework for Quantum Technologies and a growing portfolio of qualified degree programs.
“Europe’s quantum sovereignty will not be secured in a handful of elite labs,” Sherson said in the Flagship’s announcement.
Policy context
The Commission listed quantum skills as one of five areas in its Quantum Europe Strategy, published on July 2, 2025. At the June 30 event, Executive Vice-Presidents Henna Virkkunen and Roxana Mînzatu gave keynote speeches before presenting the European Digital Skills Awards 2026, the Commission said.
