Román Orús


Román Orús Lacort is a Spanish theoretical physicist who specializes in quantum information science and quantum tensor networks. He is Ikerbasque Research Professor at the Donostia International Physics Center, as well as co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer of Multiverse Computing.

Education and career

Román Orús studied physics at the University of Barcelona where he obtained his Ph.D. supervised by José Ignacio Latorre in 2006. Orús' doctoral thesis, “Entanglement, quantum phase transitions and quantum algorithms," connected quantum algorithms with quantum phase transitions.
Afterwards he developed tensor networks to study high-dimensional quantum complex systems as a research fellow at the University of Queensland with Guifré Vidal, and at the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics with Ignacio Cirac.
He became Junior Professor of Condensed Matter Physics at the Johannes Gutenberg-Universität in 2013, and Ikerbasque Research Professor at DIPC in 2018. He also held visiting professorships at CNRS and DIPC and has lectured at the Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics at UCLA.
In 2014 he published “A Practical Introduction to Tensor Networks” which describes the applications of Matrix Product States and Projected Entangled Pair States for optimization, quantum gravity, and the study of quantum many-body systems.
Orús' research on tensor networks for complex quantum systems contributed to the field's modern research and applications in machine learning.
In 2018, Orús wrote an article with Sam Mugel and Enrique Lizaso on the practical applications of quantum computing in finance. This demonstration of quantum and financial technology for enterprise led to the creation of Multiverse Computing in 2019.
Orus’ work on quantum and quantum-inspired solutions at Multiverse has also been used in projections on the future intersection of artificial intelligence and quantum computing.

Scientific work

In 2023, Orus developed an algorithm for executing complex calculations on noisy intermediate scale quantum computers to solve specialized problems like optimization.
Also in 2023, Orus designed a quantum-enhanced kernel method for image classification, applying quantum artificial intelligence to identify manufacturing defects.
In cybersecurity,  Orús demonstrated examples of possible quantum cyberattacks for symmetric-key cryptographic protocols such as AES and Blowfish that could make those ciphers vulnerable using few-qubit quantum processors.
He also developed industrial applications of tensor networks for machine learning, using tensor networks to compress Large Language Models such as ChatGPT and LLaMA, reducing size while retaining most of the original accuracy to improve energy costs and efficiency.
In 2014, Orús designed a tensor network algorithm to characterize topologically ordered systems with quantum many-body entanglement.

Entrepreneurial career

Together with Enrique Lizaso, Samuel Mugel, and Alfonso Rubio, Orús co-founded Multiverse Computing in 2019, a company focused on the industrial applications of early prototypes of quantum computers. The project originated from a working group within the Quantum World Association. Multiverse Computing was incorporated as a company in March 2019 in San Sebastián, from the outset receiving support from local authorities as well as from DIPC and BIC-Gipuzkoa.
In 2020, the company graduated from the quantum program of the Creative Destruction Lab in Toronto, and quickly became one of the world’s largest quantum computing and artificial intelligence software companies, having closed several funding rounds, including a $215M Series B closed in June 2025. Multiverse has received several awards, including the “Manuel Laborde Werlinden Award”, “Toribio Echevarria Award”, “ADEGI New Company of Gipuzkoa Award”, and was also a finalist for the “Emprendedor XXI Award”. The company also received the “Future Unicorn Award” from Digital Europe, was selected by Indra to contribute to the Future Combat Air System (FCAS) project, received the "National SME of the Year Award for Innovation and Digitalization – Honorable Mention", and was recognized by CB Insights as one of the most promising companies in the world in artificial intelligence. It was also named one of the 100 fastest-growing startups in Southern Europe in 2025 by Sifted Multiverse is also among the Spanish entities filing the most European patents, ranking fifth in 2022 and third in 2023 only behind the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) and Amadeus. The scientific developments of Orús are the foundation of the AI compression technology developed by Multiverse and validated by tech giants such as AWS

Recognition

Orús received the 2024 Physics, Innovation and Technology award from the Spanish Royal Society of Physics, which recognized Orús’ career, patents, and contributions in the field of quantum technologies.
Other awards include an honorable mention in the Václav Votruba Prize, a Marie Curie Incoming International Fellowship and the Early Career Prize of the European Physical Society, which he won alongside Ian Chapman.
Orús is steering board member of the journal Quantum as well as a member of the editorial board of the journal Symmetry.