The companies Microsoft, Google and IBM are competing with competing companies and countries to see who can create a system that uses quantum mechanics and promises much faster speeds than the current conventional technology with chemical IPs.
Quantum computers could make scientific discoveries possible, which would take millions of years with today’s classical computers, Reuters reported.
The basic unit of quantum circuits, the so-called qubit, is fast but sensitive. The quantum error itself can cause errors in the data. Because of this, quantum researchers often create more physical qubits than is necessary, and use error correction techniques to find a number of reliable and useful qubits.
Microsoft and Quantinum announced in the middle that they have made a breakthrough in this area. Microsoft applied the error-correction algorithm I wrote to Quantinum’s physical qubits and found the number of reliable qubits out of 30 physical ones.
Microsoft’s executive vice president for strategic missions and technologies, Jason Zander, said the company believes this is the best ratio of reliable qubits from a quantum chip ever recorded.
We performed more than 14 thousand individual experiments without a single error. This is an 800 krt better result than has been recorded so far, Zander told Reuters. Microsoft plans to provide this technology to clients using cloud services in five months.
Quantum researchers from various companies often state that the number of reliable qubits needed to build a perfect superpower is around 100. Neither Microsoft nor Quantinum in the center wanted to count how many years they would need to reach this goal.
