Two Singaporean brothers turned unsolvable math into Southeast Asia's first post-quantum encryption patents - Startup Fortune
Your subscription could not be saved. Please try again.
Your subscription has been successful.
AI Briefing
5 most important AI updates after 8pm every day, curated for you.
Subscribe free
Search
SF
Jun 22, 2026 · 1:55 PM<br>– Users Online
US|<br>INTERNATIONAL|<br>ASIA|<br>SF Featured
Subscribe✉
Most Read
Hyundai takes full control of Boston…<br>Big Tech is borrowing like never…<br>Russia's Putin is spending $26 billion…<br>Ant Group is rebuilding Alipay around…<br>Hyundai takes full control of Boston…<br>Big Tech is borrowing like never…<br>Russia's Putin is spending $26 billion…<br>Ant Group is rebuilding Alipay around…
Home<br>Ai
Two Singaporean brothers turned unsolvable math into Southeast Asia's first post-quantum encryption patents
Two Singaporean brothers turned unsolvable math into Southeast Asia's first post-quantum encryption patents
Elroy Fernandes
Jun 22, 2026 · 6:52 PM ·<br>4 min read<br>93 views
this.classList.remove('sf-copied'),1500)" aria-label="Copy link">
Aires Applied Quantum Technology is betting that old number theory can answer a very modern security problem: what happens to encryption when quantum computers stop being theoretical.
Most companies talking about post-quantum security start with the same warning: one day, powerful quantum machines could break parts of today's public-key encryption. Aires Applied Quantum Technology starts somewhere stranger. Its story runs through Diophantine equations, the stubborn class of mathematical problems built around integer solutions, and through two Singaporean brothers who say that stubbornness can be turned into protection.
Lim Meng Liang and Ken Lin founded Aires around that idea. Lim, an applied mathematics graduate from the National University of Singapore, had spent years around equations that many people treat as beautiful but commercially useless. During the COVID-19 lockdowns, he returned to them with a practical question: if some problems resist clean solving, can that resistance become the basis for encryption?
The answer, according to the company, became a US patent secured in 2022 for a method that uses those equations to encrypt data. Aires says that patent forms the core of its post-quantum cryptography platform and makes it the first company in Southeast Asia to file internationally recognized patents in the field. That is a serious claim, and it should be read carefully. A patent is not the same thing as a deployed security standard, but it does mean the company has put a specific mathematical approach on record rather than simply borrowing the language of the quantum security boom.
Also read: Getty Images stock triples after sealing a display deal with OpenAI that bets on licensing over litigation • Seedcamp closes its largest fund yet at $320 million and bets the next decade on physical AI • SK Hynix surpasses Samsung to become South Korea's most valuable company as AI memory demand reshapes the semiconductor hierarchy
You should care about the distinction because post-quantum cryptography is already crowded with claims. Banks, cloud providers and government agencies are preparing for a shift away from cryptographic systems that could be weakened by quantum attacks. The US National Institute of Standards and Technology has already selected post-quantum algorithms for standardization, which gives buyers a practical path to follow. Any startup entering this space has to explain why its method deserves attention beside that official track.
Aires' answer is that its mathematics is different. Instead of leaning only on the lattice-based approaches now common in post-quantum discussions, the company is pointing to Diophantine equations as the hard problem at the center of its system. That gives the pitch some substance. It also gives customers something to test, attack and question. Frankly, that is where the real work begins. In security, a clever patent is only useful after other serious people have tried to break the idea and failed.
The Singapore angle matters too. Southeast Asia has plenty of fintech platforms, data-heavy businesses and public-sector digital systems that will eventually need post-quantum migration plans. The region does not need another vague cybersecurity brand promising to protect everything from everything. It needs specific tools that can be measured against real standards, real audits and real deployment constraints. Aires is more interesting because its claim is narrow: two founders, a mathematical method, a 2022 US patent and a platform built from that work.
That still leaves the hard questions open. Who has tested the system outside the company? How does it perform against standardized post-quantum algorithms? Can it run at the speed and scale required by banks, telecoms or cloud infrastructure? Those are not side issues. They are the business.
For now, Aires has done enough to...