Category Archives: Quantum Computing
The quantum computing bubble – Financial Times
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- View Full Coverage on Google News
Baidu Releases Superconducting Quantum Computer and World’s First All-Platform Integration Solution, Making Quantum Computing Within Reach – PR…
BEIJING, Aug. 25, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Baidu, Inc. (NASDAQ: BIDU and HKEX: 9888) ("Baidu" or the "Company"), a leading AI company with strong Internet foundation, today announced its first superconducting quantum computer that fully integrates hardware, software, and applications. On top of this, Baidu also introduced the world's first all-platform quantum hardware-software integration solution that provides access to various quantum chips via mobile app, PC, and cloud. Launched at Quantum Create 2022, a quantum developer conference held in Beijing, this new offering paves the way for the long-awaited industrialization of quantum computing.
A revolutionary technology that harnesses the laws of quantum mechanics to solve problems beyond the reach of classical computers, quantum computing is expected to bring ground-breaking transformations in fields like artificial intelligence (AI), computational biology, material simulation, and financial technology. However, a significant gap remains between quantum devices and services.
"Qian Shi"[1], Baidu's industry-level superconducting quantum computer incorporates its hardware platform with Baidu's home-grown software stack[2]. On top of this infrastructure are numerous practical quantum applications, such as quantum algorithms used to design new materials for novel lithium batteries or simulate protein folding.
Qian Shi offers a stable and substantial quantum computing service to the public with high-fidelity 10 quantum bits (qubits) of power. In addition, Baidu has recently completed the design of a 36-qubit superconducting quantum chip with couplers, which demonstrates promising simulation results across key metrics.
As quantum computing continues to experience remarkable progress, a large number of enterprises are exploring how quantum computing will contribute to their real-world businesses. This has led to the development of "Liang Xi"[3], the world's first all-platform quantum hardware-software integration solution that offers versatile quantum services through private deployment, cloud services, and hardware access. Liang Xi is able to plug into Qian Shi and other third-party quantum computers, including a 10-qubit superconducting quantum device and a trapped ion quantum device developed by the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Users can conveniently visit these quantum computational resources via mobile app, PC, and cloud.
"With Qian Shi and Liang Xi, users can create quantum algorithms and use quantum computing power without developing their own quantum hardware, control systems, or programming languages," said Dr. Runyao Duan, Director of the Institute for Quantum Computing at Baidu Research. "Baidu's innovations make it possible to access quantum computing anytime and anywhere, even via smartphone. Baidu's platform is also instantly compatible with a wide range of quantum chips, meaning 'plug-and-play' access is now a reality."
These latest innovations are backed by Baidu Research's Institute for Quantum Computing, whose technological footprint covers a wide range of areas, including quantum algorithms and applications, communications and networks, encryption and security, error correction, architecture, measurement and control, and chip design. Across more than four years of research and development, Baidu has submitted over 200 core technology patent applications in the quantum technology field.
About Institute for Quantum Computing at Baidu Research
The Institute for Quantum Computing at Baidu Research was established in March 2018 by Dr. Runyao Duan, founding director of the Quantum Software and Information Centre at the University of Technology Sydney. With quantum computing playing a crucial role in next-generation computing technology, Baidu aims to integrate quantum technologies into Baidu's core business, with the institute developing towards the goal of becoming a world-leading Quantum Artificial Intelligence (AI) research.
The Institute for Quantum Computing at Baidu Research aims at building full-stack quantum software and hardware solutions, and focuses on the breakthrough in fundamental Quantum research, the construction of autonomous and controllable quantum Infrastructure, the acceleration in practical quantum frontier Applications, and the development of industrial quantum Network, which altogether form Baidu's QIAN strategy. In building an open and sustainable quantum ecosystem, Baidu strives to achieve the vision of a world where "Everyone Can Quantum".
About Baidu
Founded in 2000, Baidu's mission is to make the complicated world simpler through technology. Baidu is a leading AI company with strong Internet foundation, trading on the NASDAQ under "BIDU" and HKEX under "9888." One Baidu ADS represents eight Class A ordinary shares.
Note:
1. Qian Shi () means "the origin of all things is found in the heavens" in Chinese.
2. Baidu's quantum software stack includes Quanlse, a cloud-based platform for quantum control, Quantum Leaf, a cloud-native quantum computing platform, QNET, a quantum network toolkit, QEP, a quantum error processing toolkit, and Paddle Quantum, a quantum machine learning platform. Learn more at quantum.baidu.com.
3. Liang Xi ().
Media Contact[emailprotected]
SOURCE Baidu, Inc.
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Baidu Releases Superconducting Quantum Computer and World's First All-Platform Integration Solution, Making Quantum Computing Within Reach - PR...
Multiverse and BASF Partner to Research Quantum Use for Foreign Exchange Optimization – Quantum Computing Report
Multiverse and BASF Partner to Research Quantum Use for Foreign Exchange Optimization
At first glance you might wonder why BASF, a large chemical company, would be working with Multiverse Computing to use quantum computing for a financial problem. But on closer look, you would see that BASF is a giant company with 2021 revenues of 78.6billion ($78.2B USD) and operates in over 190 countries. So they need to convert currencies in their operations all the time and even small improvements in the exchange rates that they can achieve could be worth a lot of money. The team started a small 9 month research effort in January 2022 that focused only on the trading between Euros and U.S. dollars. It will be completed shortly and the team will issue a final technical report. Presumably, if this first trial is a success the companies will move on to subsequent phases that may incorporate more currencies or more complicated scenarios. For more about this project, you can read a press release issued by Multiverse that you can access here.
August 23, 2022
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Multiverse and BASF Partner to Research Quantum Use for Foreign Exchange Optimization - Quantum Computing Report
D-Wave Releases Its Second Quarter and First Half 2022 Financial Results – Quantum Computing Report
D-Wave Releases Its Second Quarter and First Half 2022 Financial Results
For its second quarter of fiscal 2022, D-Wave reported revenues of $1.371 million versus $1.137 million in the second quarter of 2021. Adjusted EBITDA showed a loss of $10.385 million versus a loss of $8.804 million in the same period a year ago and GAAP Net loss was $13.198 million versus a net loss of $4.668 million in 2021. The company reported that its customer base consists of 95 customers of which 55 are commercial organizations, representing an increase of 44% in the number of commercial organization customers in the past year. CEO Alan Baratz acknowledge during the earning calls certain headwinds stemming largely from the economic environment. To help adjust for these changes, they are increasing their budgets for go to market activities and moderating the budget growth in other areas. Despite this, he indicated that progress in their development programs has remained on-track or even been ahead of schedule in some cases. The company ended the quarter with about $10.5 million in cash, however they have announced an agreement that will provide them with a committed equity facility for up to $150 million. You can access a press release from D-Wave with their earnings announcement on their web page here and listen to their Q2 earnings call here.
August 18, 2022
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D-Wave Releases Its Second Quarter and First Half 2022 Financial Results - Quantum Computing Report
Multiverse and IQM Partner to Create Application Specific Quantum Computers – Quantum Computing Report
Multiverse and IQM Partner to Create Application Specific Quantum Computers
Multiverse Computing is a quantum software company based in Spain that tackles complex problems in finance, manufacturing, energy and other sectors with their proprietary quantum and quantum-inspired algorithms within its Singularity SDK. IQM is a European quantum hardware manufacturer that is focused on providing on-premise quantum processors for supercomputing data centers and research labs. As part of its efforts, IQM has engaged in a number of different projects, including a program funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, abbreviated BMBF. to develop application specific quantum processors to provide hardware optimized for specific use cases.
The two companies have entered into partnership to tightly integrate IQMs co-designed quantum processors with Multiverses Singularity SDK. When designing an application specific processor, one needs to have a deep understanding of the application and the specific algorithms that will be needed to provide solutions. IQM will be coordinating this effort through their office in Madrid, Spain to help the further development of the Spanish quantum ecosystem. Additional information about this new partnership is available in a press release located on the IQM website here.
August 19, 2022
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Multiverse and IQM Partner to Create Application Specific Quantum Computers - Quantum Computing Report
LLNL Joins Forces with HPC Centers in US and Europe to Form IASC – HPCwire
Aug. 16, 2022 Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) has signed a memorandum of understanding with high performance computing (HPC) facilities in Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States, jointly forming the International Association of Supercomputing Centers (IASC).
LLNL and co-founders the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) Hartree Centre, the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) and Leibniz Supercomputing Centre of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities (LRZ) envision the IASC as a conduit for determining computing center management best practices, studying solutions for major common challenges and fostering communication and collaboration among the centers, partners and users.
With a long history of leadership in HPC, LLNL stands to benefit from its IASC membership by strengthening its legacy and supporting its national security mission, according to former High Performance Computing Innovation Center Director Wayne Miller, who was instrumental in the founding of the IASC.
We have had an enthusiastic response to the creation of the IASC from major compute centers across the globe, including LLNL, and also from more topical centers serving smaller user communities, Miller said. We also are talking to regional center associations that represent many constituent centers; all are facing the same problems and are welcoming this opportunity to have a broader, problem-focused collaboration. The common refrain were hearing is: Im surprised this doesnt exist already.
By joining IASC, the Hartree Centre as part of its goals of adding scalability and functionality for research and development and improving user accessibility to include organizations without HPC resources seeks to learn and share good practices for operating HPC centers.
Public-facing supercomputing centers have a unique set of problems that are complex or complicated in nature, said Michael Gleaves, deputy director of the Hartree Centre. I think there are plenty of initial areas that we are all struggling with today that we can use to generate collaboration. Weve announced the IASC to engage the global supercomputer center community and talk about why, what and how it can be of value.
One of the original supercomputing centers in the U.S., the NCSA sited at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign hopes the IASC will offer computing centers the opportunity to collaborate and share similar expertise in research, computing, application development, thought leadership and innovation, while working together to solve grand challenges.
IASC represents the opportunity to address common challenges in supercomputing centers around the world talent, resources, diversity, unique compute architecture, said Brendan McGinty, director of industry at NCSA. Industry has long provided some of the largest datasets from which supercomputers have solved the grandest of challenges. The evolution from petascale to exascale in a decade, combined with the confluence of AI on traditional HPC domain solutions, has accelerated the time to and depth of solution. Industry has now fully caught up to advanced computing and that marriage has never been more important. It will take collaborations between centers with like talent and resources to address all the opportunities to help us all to evolve.
The LRZ a computing user facility founded in 1962 that serves Munichs top universities and colleges as well as research institutions in Bavaria, Germany and Europe intends to utilize the IASC to address key operational and technical issues, including operating and streamlining center infrastructure, user engagement and experience optimization, workforce development and best practice exchange.
With the IASC, we can achieve more together and learn from each other. We have common topics such as integrating quantum computing into our traditional systems, attracting and training a modern workforce and working toward climate-neutral operations, said Laura Schulz, department head of quantum computing at LRZ. So far, supercomputing centers have largely solved these issues for themselves, but we can optimize it by partnering in the IASC. Our next goal is to go on a virtual global listening tour to talk to centers around the world about their common challenges.
The participants plan to report on the results of their virtual tour at an appropriate conference in the next year. As they look to add more members, IASC participants will meet monthly and examine options for organizing the association. They also will evaluate the most useful modalities for continually addressing key challenges from member institutions and options for expanding membership.
Visit the website to learn more about IASC.
Editors Note: To learn even more about the IASC, read our feature coverage of its debut here.
Source: LLNL
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LLNL Joins Forces with HPC Centers in US and Europe to Form IASC - HPCwire
The unpredictable rise of quantum computing – have recent breakthroughs accelerated the timeline? – Diginomica
Everyone knows by now how weird quantum mechanics can be. Things with quantum computers have gotten ten degrees of weirdness lately. First, a new kind of matter appears to have been observed with two time dimensions.
Let's think about that for a minute. Suppose we were aware of this in our physical world. Maybe there would be Miller Time and Half Time simultaneously.
Okay, maybe thats not so hard to imagine, but suppose you existed in two different timelines, similar but different. Or, maybe everything is the same in one timeline but working in a coal mine in the other.
If you think that's mind-boggling, thisweird quirk of quantum mechanics behavesas though it has two time dimensions instead of one; a trait that scientists say makes the qubits more robust, and able to remain stable for important lengths of time.
The work represents "a completely different way of thinking about phases of matter,"according to computational quantum physicist Philipp Dumitrescuof the Flatiron Institute, the lead author of a new paper describing the phenomenon.
How did physicists figure this out? It seems they pulsed light on the qubits in a pattern mimicking the Fibonacci sequence. This is one of those things that is stunning, things were discovered in the thirteenth century, and they pop up in completely unexpected ways. The Fibonacci is a sequence in which each number is the sum of the two preceding numbers and graphically creates a beautiful spiral repeated in nature in a million ways.
And by the way, as the Fibonacci numbers get large, the quotient between each successive pair of Fibonacci numbers approximates 1.612, known as early as the Greeks as the Golden Ratio of Beauty. This mathematical symmetry algorithm underlies our perception of attractiveness. It also appears in the shapes of spiral galaxies, hurricanes, snail shells, the distribution of flower petals and even in the proportions of the human body.
How they did this takes a little explanation.
Stability in quantum computers is called quantum coherence, and it's one of the main goals for an error-free quantum computerand one of the most difficult to achieve. A central problem in quantum computing is decoherence, or the collapse of coherence. The qubits are an unruly bunch from environmental disturbance, failing to maintain temperature near absolute zero, and entanglement, where qubits affect each other. Enforcing symmetry is one approach to protecting qubits from decoherence. An example of symmetry is a square, which, when rotated ninety degrees, is still the same shape. Symmetry protects forms from certain rotational effects.. Thats where the two time dimension discovery comes in.
This is where it gets a little dense. Tapping qubits with evenly spaced laser pulses ensures a symmetry-based not in space but in time, a symmetrical periodicity. But these researchers theorized they could create an asymmetrical quasiperiodicity, allowing them to bury a second time dimension in the first.
Net effect? For the periodic sequence, the qubits were stable for 1.5 seconds. For the quasiperiodic sequence, they remained stable for 5.5 seconds. The additional time symmetry, the researchers said, added another layer of protection against quantum decoherence.
So despite all the physics and terms like asymmetrical quasiperiodicity, the takeaway is that quantum researchers have made a significant achievement in the most daunting quantum problem, making the quibits behave long enough to solve a problem. If that isnt enough to chew on, another startling discovery was just disclosed.
Everything weve understood about quantum computers was that a single qubit can have a state of 0 and 1 simultaneously (superposition), but apparently, that is not the case. They can have multiple states simultaneously. This dramatically increases the richness and complexity of a single qubit allowing for
For decades computers have been synonymous with binary information -- zeros and ones. A team at the University of Innsbruck, Austria realized a quantum computer that breaks out of this paradigm and unlocks additional computational resources hidden in almost all of today's quantum devices. In an article, Quantum computer works with more than zero and one, researchers at Innsbruck, Austria, developed a quantum computer that breaks the 2-dimension operation.
In the Innsbruck quantum computer, information is stored in individual trapped Calcium atoms. Each of these atoms has eight different states. I have not been able to determine why its eight. The atomic number of calcium is 20. Typically only two states are used to store information in other quantum computers. Almost all existing quantum computers have access to more quantum states than they use for computation.
On the flip side, many tasks that need quantum computers, such as problems in physics, chemistry, ormaterial science, are also naturally expressed in the qudit language (qudit provides a larger state space to store and process information).. Rewriting them for qubits can often make them too complicated for today's quantum computers. "Working with more than zeros and ones is very natural, not only for the quantum computer but also for its applications, allowing us to unlock the true potential ofquantum systems, explains Martin Ringbauer.
Whats the meaning of all of this? Inan article two years ago, I wrote:
Google plans to search for commercially viable applications in the short term, but they dont think there will be many for another ten years - a time frame I've heard one referred to as bound but loose. What that meant was, no more than ten, maybe sooner. In the industry, the term for the current state of the art isNISQ Noisy, Interim Scale Quantum Computing.
The largest quantum computers are in the 50-70 qubit range, and Google feels NISQ has a ceiling of maybe two hundred. The "noisy" part of NISQ is because the qubits need to interact and be nearby. That generates noise. The more qubits, the more noise, and the more challenging it is to control the noise.
But Google suggests the real unsolved problems in fields like optimization, materials science, chemistry, drug discovery, finance, and electronics will take machines with thousands of qubits and even envision one million on a planar array etched in aluminum. Major problems need solving, such as noise elimination, coherence, and lifetime (a qubit holds its position in a tiny time slice).
So the question is, is this moving faster than Google imagined, or was their 10-year projection just a head fake to slow competitors down?
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The unpredictable rise of quantum computing - have recent breakthroughs accelerated the timeline? - Diginomica
Multiverse Computing and IQM Quantum Partner on Application-Specific Processors – High-Performance Computing News Analysis | insideHPC – insideHPC
SAN SEBASTIN, SPAIN, August 18, 2022Multiverse Computing, a quantum computing company, and IQM Quantum Computers today announced a partnership to develop integrated solutions for specific quantum-based applications in finance, energy, chemistry, logistics, material science and other verticals.
Through this partnership, both companies will tightly integrate IQMs co-designed quantum processors with Multiverses Singularity SDK to accelerate the path to quantum advantage in solving real-world problems. Engineers will design application-specific processors that leverage the strengths of each product and the companys deep customer knowledge to offer the best custom solutions.
This partnership combines the best solutions in todays quantum software and hardware, says Dr. Peter Eder, Head of Partnerships of IQM Quantum Computers. We are bringing some of the best quantum experts in this world together to find a fast lane to quantum advantage. Our customers and end-users globally will benefit from this unique joint offering, and we cant wait to share the results of this collaboration.
While Multiverse can offer added value today with our quantum-inspired solutions, being a part of a custom full-stack solution is key for Singularitys adoption and will ultimately drive the adoption of quantum computing technologies, said Mehdi Bozzo-Rey, Chief Revenue Officer at Multiverse Computing.This combined offering means both our customers can explore the power of quantum computing with customized solutions dedicated to solving their particular business challenges.
Jani Heikkinen, Head ofBusiness Development and Country Managerof IQM Quantum ComputersSpain S.L., said, IQM is well-positioned to support our partners in Spain through our Madrid office. This partnership with a leading Spanish quantum software company boosts our European leadership and our commitment to develop the Spanish quantum ecosystem.
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Multiverse Computing and IQM Quantum Partner on Application-Specific Processors - High-Performance Computing News Analysis | insideHPC - insideHPC
D-Wave is the third quantum startup to SPAC in less than a year – Fast Company
D-Wave completed a planned merger on Monday with DPCM Capital (the latter of which was already listed on the New York Stock Exchange), making the Canada-basedfirm the third quantum player to go public via a SPACthat is, a special purpose acquisition companywithin the last year. (The other companies? Rigetti and IonQ.)
Its an interesting trend, but perhaps not a surprising one: According to D-Wave CEO Alan Baratz, the until-recently-obscure financial quirk offers his companyone thats in a still-budding sectorfaster access to capital.
In some sense SPACs are ideal for a company that has huge potential but is going to take some time to mature,he tells Fast Company. With a SPAC, youre able to tap into the funding sources in the public markets to accelerate your growth and do it based on the future potential.
A traditional IPO, on the other hand, is all about today, he adds.
SPACs can also save companies money (though this point is subject to some debate). I dont think all SPACs should be discounted, says Patrick Moorhead of Moor Insights & Strategy, a consulting firm. Its a much less expensive way to go public and takes less time and effort.
So far, D-Waves post-SPAC stock is holding its own. It opened at $9.98 Monday and closed at $11.86 on Thursday. But Rigetti and IonQ havent fared as well. Rigetti has seen its shares drop in value by roughly half since its listing on the NASDAQ in March. IonQs shares have lost about 40% of their value since its listing in October 2021.
In the young field of quantum computing, D-Wave has emerged as a major character. Back in 2011, the company became the first to actually sell a quantum computer; it now counts NASA, Google, and Lockheed Martin as customers.
Building and operating a quantum computer is an extraordinary feat of science and engineering. Instead of the bits used in traditional computers (which can be set to zero or one), quantum computers use subatomic particles called qubits, which can represent many values between zero and one, as well as zero and one at the same time (a superposition). Qubits can also entangle to represent values in extremely complex problems. In order to take advantage of these properties, the computer has to control the state of the qubits, whose erratic behavior is governed by quantum physics, not regular physics. This is very hard, and usually involves supercooling the qubits to slow their constant spin, then using lasers or electricity to control their state.
D-Wave was able to get to market with a quantum computer because it adopted a unique approach to working with the qubitsone that asks far less of them. What its looking for is the minimum energy level within a qubit, and by finding the minimum energy level, then theyre able to find the most optimized solution to a problem, says Heather West, research manager at research firm IDC. And thats why D-Wave is able to say they have 5,000 to 7,000 qubits in their system versus an IBM, which is still down around 127.
Even though that approach, called quantum annealing, doesnt try to exert a lot of control over the states of the qubits, its still very useful for solving optimization problemsthat is, problems where the goal is to find the best solution among a huge number of possibles. An optimization problem might be finding the optimal routes and cargos for a large fleet of delivery trucks, or finding the optimal number of employees to schedule on a given day. Its a common type of business puzzle, and annealers are especially good at solving them.
Some of these industries really gravitated toward D-Wave because of those optimization problems, and being able to pull in all sorts of data to find these optimized solutions and solving problems faster was really appealing, West says.
That application is a good example of the way companies are using quantum services like D-Wave today. Theyre looking for problem types where classical computers struggle and quantum computers excel.
They [D-Wave] are really more of an accelerator, says Ashish Nadkarni, group VP and general manager at IDC. We are not at the point where you can completely run all kinds of jobs on a quantum computer.
But D-Waves annealer may eventually be seen as a forerunner to a more robust kind of quantum computing, called gate model, in which the quantum computer takes full advantage of the quantum properties of the qubitstheir many possible states, their capacity for superposition, and the compute power enabled by multiple qubits entangling with each other.
Controlling and leveraging these properties opens the possibility of solving problems that are far beyond the reach of classical supercomputers (and annealers). These are large probabilistic problems where the qubits are asked to model huge and complex data sets. It could be modeling all the receptors in the brain to explore how theyll react to a drug, or a huge array of stock market conditions to predict their effect on the price of a certain commodity.
Realizing that much of the upside and excitement around quantum computing is coming from the possibility to solve such problems, D-Wave announced last year that it had begun building gate-model quantum computers more like the ones built by Google, IBM, and IonQ. D-Wave will need years to develop its gate-model quantum, but Baratz believes offering both annealers and gate-model quantum computing will eventually put his company at an advantage.
By doing both and being the only company thats doing both, were the only company in the world that will be able to address the full market for quantum, and the full set of use cases, he says. D-Waves customers typically tap into these computing services via a dedicated cloud service.
Because quantum is considered a nascent technology, many potential customers (such as companies in the financial services and pharmaceutical industries) are experimenting with running certain types of algorithms on quantum systems to look for some advantage over classical computing. But theyre not necessarily paying customers.
Baratz says that its the gate-model quantum services that are nascent technology, not D-Waves annealers, which he says are ready to deliver real value today. He believes the gate-model quantum computers are still as many as seven years away from being able to run general business applications in a way that beats classical computers.
Baratz believes that D-Wave is now challenged to make sure customers differentiate between gate-model computingwhich he says could be as many as seven years away from running real business applicationsand D-Waves quantum annealing service, which is mature and ready to deliver value today. While his gate-model competitors are out telling customers its okay to dip their toes into the water and experiment, D-Wave must counter that narrative in the marketplace with the message that customers can be doing real optimization work using quantum annealing now.
We truly are commercial, so when our competitors talk about revenue, they talk about government research grants as revenue, and they talk about national labs and academic institutions as customers, Baratz says. When we talk about our customers, we talk about our recently announced deal with MasterCard, or Deloitte or Johnson & Johnson or Volkswagen.
Baratz says over 65% of D-Waves quantum cloud revenue last year came from more than 50 commercial customers, which include over two dozen members of the Forbes Global 2000.
Baratz says D-Wave is now entering a phase in which it can leverage its annealers to start customer relationships.
We do have a significant head start, but we think now is the time to really make the investment to grow that loyal customer base and get the market share, Baratz says.And then, as we bring new generations of annealing to market, its just an upsell to more complex applications as we bring gate [model] to market.
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D-Wave is the third quantum startup to SPAC in less than a year - Fast Company
Canadian non-profit gets funding to raise awareness of quantum computing threat – IT World Canada
A public-private agency that helps Canadian organizations shift to technologies that protect their encrypted data from being broken by quantum computers has been given a federal grant of $675,000 to help its work.
Public Safety Canada said Tuesday that the money going to Quantum-Safe Canada will support its work to prepare the countrys critical infrastructure for the quantum threat.
Organizations that hold encrypted data include governments, financial institutions, energy providers, research facilities, telcos, and manufacturers of sensitive products.
Quantum computers capable of breaking current encryption may be years away but organizations have to start preparing now, agency executive director Michele Mosca said in an interview.
And now means they should have their transition plans to quantum-safe solutions finished by next year. Thats because standardized quantum-resistant encryption algorithms are expected to be approved by the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in 2024, so high-risk organizations can begin their transition. That will include selecting solution providers and testing their solutions.
Related content: NIST names first four quantum-resistant tools
The top critical infrastructures with a big IT footprint really should be wrapping up their preparation and assessment phase in a year or so and be starting the roadmapping by 2024. By that year, things will start kicking into gear on the solutions side. The standardized algorithms will be ready and there will be no need to delay, Mosca noted.
Countries not necessarily friendly to the West, including China and Russia, are pouring hundreds of millions into quantum computing research. No one is quite sure when they will be able to produce a machine that can crack current encryption.
Related content: Montreal firm delivers quantum computer
But, Mosca said, given the time it will take for organizations to migrate to quantum-resistant solutions, they cant wait until one is churning away.
You have to at least tentatively pick a date by which you want your systems ready. You have to look at your risk tolerance, and if its less than 10 per cent meaning a 10 per cent chance of broken encryption will cause the firm serious damage you really want to have migrated within 10 years.
Some people may not want even a one per cent chance, in which case they have to do something faster, he added.
Major governments are aiming to transition their critical applications by the early 2030s, he pointed out. That may be nine years away, but Mosca warned it will take a lot of work to upgrade systems.
Dont forget, he added, the Canadian, U.S. and other governments have already decided to migrate their systems to quantum-safe solutions.
Related content: Companies warned in 2019 to start working on quantum-resistant solutions
Quantum-Safe Canada is a not-for-profit whose governing board includes Sami Khoury, head of the federal governments Canadian Centre for Cyber Security; Robert Gordon, former executive director and currently strategic advisor of the Canadian Cyber Threat Exchange; Vanda Vicars, chief operating officer of the Global Risk Institute in Financial Services; and consultant Brian OHiggins, an expert in public-key infrastructure.
Mosca, who also sits on the board, is a co-founder of the Institute for Quantum Computing and a professor at the University of Waterloo, as well as a co-founder of a quantum software startup called EvolutionQ.
There are four steps to quantum readiness, he said: Understanding what the problem is, understanding what it means to the organization and its peers, planning and testing quantum-safe solutions and, finally, deploying the solutions.
The funds announced Tuesday are small compared to the monies available in the public and private sectors for fundamental quantum research, he said. But money for awareness is vital.
This particular grant will help the energy and finance sectors understand the early preparation steps we neglect and wish [later] we had done.
The funds will also be spent to help identify the skills needed for the transition and implementation stages so vendors, colleges and universities can train and expand the workforce.
Its not just a few computer science programmers writing code that will be needed, he stressed. Project planners, managers, system integrators, experts in risk assessments, business analysts and more will be needed. And it wouldnt necessarily mean years of training. It could mean adding an extra course to a college degree, he added.
The federal funds come from Ottawas Cyber Security Co-operation Program, which was launched in 2019 under the National Cyber Security Strategy. Through the program, $10.3 million in funding was allocated to support projects that contribute to positioning Canada as a global leader in cyber security.
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Canadian non-profit gets funding to raise awareness of quantum computing threat - IT World Canada