Why AQSolotl? The story behind our name.

Every startup has a story. Ours started in research labs, surrounded by qubits, with Patrick Bore, Dr. Yap Yung Szen and Dr. Rainer Dumke sharing a belief that quantum computing deserved better tools.

AQSolotl was born from years of research at the Centre for Quantum Technologies (CQT), sitting between two of the world's top 15 universities: Nanyang Technological University (NTU) and the National University of Singapore (NUS), where scientists and engineers worked together to solve one of quantum computing's biggest engineering challenges. What began as an academic collaboration eventually became something bigger: the decision to leave the lab and build a company capable of bringing this technology into the real world.

So... why AQSolotl?

People ask us this all the time: is it because we really like axolotls? Well, yes. But that's only half the story — and honestly, the real version is a bit less tidy (and a bit more S.H.I.E.L.D. from MARVEL).

Mid-brainstorm, for a reason none of us quite remember anymore, someone said "axolotl." A couple of people in the room — who shall remain nameless (Rainer) — had no idea what that even was.

Once it was explained, everyone agreed: it's genuinely adorable. But two problems stood in the way.

First, we're a quantum computing startup. We felt we had a duty to get a Q in there somewhere. Second, we weren't exactly excited to spend the next few years fighting a cute salamander for Google search rankings. So we checked — back then, "aqsolotl" returned zero search results. A blank slate. That's what pushed us from axolotl to aqsolotl, swapping the X for a QS. And the moment we did, the acronym found its meaning almost instantly:

Adaptable Quantum Solution

which also happens to hand us the "Sol" in AQSolotl for free.

We kept brainstorming after that, but nothing else came close. The only real alternative was simply "AQS" on its own, for simplicity's sake — until we found out the domain AQS.com would cost around $100,000 USD. We unanimously decided that money was much better spent on R&D than on a domain name.

There was one more thing AQSolotl solved for us: color. Quantum computing is a crowded field, and most of it lives in blue and green. We wanted to stand apart from the rest of the pack, further from that palette. The axolotl's iconic pink made that decision easy.

The world's cutest quantum mascot

If you've never met an axolotl, here's why we think it earned its place in our story.

• It lives between worlds. Axolotls spend their entire lives in water while retaining features usually associated with earlier life stages. In a way, AQSolotl lives between two worlds too: classical computing and quantum computing, helping both work together.

• It regenerates. An axolotl can regrow entire limbs. We believe the future belongs to systems that are resilient, flexible, and designed to keep improving.

• It's adorable. Deep tech can feel intimidating. We like that our name makes people smile before they even know what we do.

Maybe one day...

We have a small dream.

One day, we'd love to adopt an axolotl in our lab.

Because behind every ambitious technology, every late night, and every breakthrough, it's good to remember why we started in the first place: to build something adaptable, to make quantum computing more accessible, and to prove that even the most advanced technologies can have a story—and a mascot—that people remember.