Managing Editor’s Note: Today’s Quantum Week issue digs into the broader application of quantum – especially quantum empowered with other technology – on other industries… both in the present and what that could look like in the future.
As Jeff points out today, this technological convergence is about empowering humans to tackle the most complex problems in every industry… And it’s happening now.
Jeff’s been tracking the development of quantum technology for years. And over the past 12 or so months, things have been heating up in the industry. Jeff believes we’re reaching the Quantum Flashpoint – the moment when a technology enters an exponential phase of progress, creating an opportunity for exponential gains…
Which is why Jeff is holding a strategy session next Tuesday, October 21. You can go here to automatically sign up to join him that evening at 8 p.m. ET.
Just go here to add your name to the guest list with one click.
This summer, an interesting quantum collaboration was announced between IBM (IBM) and RIKEN.
The RIKEN Center for Computational Science is located in Kobe, Japan.
It is the home of Fugaku, which was the world’s fastest supercomputer from June 2020 – June 2022.
It’s now the seventh fastest. Needless to say, there have been a lot of developments in supercomputing in the last three years.
Fugaku | Source: RIKEN Center for Computational Science
It was an interesting partnership announcement for IBM, as IBM’s goal was combine the power of its quantum computing system with the power of one of the fastest classical supercomputers in the world.
IBM’s Quantum Computer | Source: IBM
IBM has been quietly making progress with its superconducting quantum computing technology, with its latest superconducting quantum semiconductor – Heron – supporting an impressive 156 quantum bits (qubits).
IBM’s Heron | Source: IBM
As a reminder, qubits are the fundamental building blocks of quantum computers. They can be represented by circuits, atoms, photons, or other forms of exotic matter.
The approach that IBM has been taking has been what the company calls quantum-centric supercomputing.
IBM is still swinging for the fences with plans to deliver a large-scale, fault-tolerant quantum computer in 2029.
But it is already demonstrating the incredible capabilities of quantum-centric supercomputing today.
The idea is simple.
Classical supercomputers are limited to binary processing. Namely, that each transistor can only be in one state – a zero or a one. Because of this, classical computers scale linearly.
Despite their limitations, they do many tasks extremely well, as evidenced by how we use computers and hyperscale data centers today.
Quantum computers, on the other hand, have extraordinary powers.
They aren’t limited by binary processing, and they can scale exponentially… enabling the ability to solve complex problems that are impossible to solve by a classical supercomputer.
Source: Adobe Stock Images
This was the point of the collaboration between IBM and RIKEN: Pair both powerful computing systems to solve a complex problem.
And that’s what they did.
The goal was to solve a complex chemistry problem, specifically to determine the ground state energies and properties for a challenging molecule like Nitrogen (N2). I’ll explain the real-world value of doing this in just a moment.
The key to this combination was to offload all the processing that could be managed by Fugaku… and leave the most complex calculations to IBM’s quantum computer.
The purpose is to take advantage of a quantum computer’s limited coherence times with computations that require quantum computing… and leave the rest for a classical supercomputer. Doing so optimizes the outcome.
The two teams were able to not only model the ground state energies for Nitrogen, but also model iron-sulfur clusters, which apply to both agriculture and industrial chemistry.
The key point is that being able to use quantum computing – to discover the ground state energies – means unlocking the ability to predict molecular behavior.
Why would such an ability be useful? Let me show you…
Once a quantum computer cracks the ground state energies for a molecule, then the information can be fed to an AI-powered supercomputer to predict the molecular behavior.
From there, the implications are profound.
Here are the practical applications for how quantum computing is already being used today:
It’s important to mention again. This isn’t a theory. This is precisely what quantum computers are being used for today.
And IBM’s approach to pair its own quantum computers with a classical supercomputer like Fugaku is a smart approach to ensuring that it can get every ounce of power out of its quantum computer.
Collaborations like this are only beginning – and they’re happening everywhere, quietly, in labs, research centers, private boardrooms, around the world – outside of the realm of public awareness.
Companies are racing to achieve the end goals of solving complex problems that are out of the reach of any classical supercomputer within any reasonable amount of time. Which is to say that these problems have been impossible to solve in our lifetimes…
Until now.
I know that quantum chemistry might seem a bit abstract, despite the immediate impact on the industries I mentioned above.
Perhaps easier to understand are applications in financial services.
Just last month, IBM announced two major initiatives in the industry that are pretty easy to grasp:
IBM and Vanguard have been working together to use quantum computing for portfolio optimization.
Optimizing a portfolio of assets with 20 or 30 investments is fairly straightforward and can easily be done with classical computing. But optimizing a portfolio with thousands of investments across a wide range of asset classes is an entirely different story.
Classical computers can’t perform a task like this in any reasonable timeframe, but quantum computers are already capable of doing so.
An optimized portfolio for a large institutional investor can be worth billions of dollars.
IBM and HSBC combined efforts to use quantum computing as applied to algorithmic bond trading.
HSBC used all of its real-world bond trading data and IBM’s quantum computer to develop a predictive model that was a 34% improvement over HSBC’s previous approach.
It would have been impossible to achieve these kinds of results without the use of a quantum computer.
Naturally, when we think about quantum computers applied to the financial services industry, there are trillions of dollars at stake.
There are opportunities for optimization, improvements in risk management, and the ability to identify mispricing and arbitrage everywhere.
And quantum computers aren’t just about finance, chemistry, molecular structure, semiconductors, accelerating drug discovery, and new materials discovery.
This convergence of technology is about empowering the human race to tackle the most complex problems in every industry that are simply unreachable using classical computing technology.
Quantum computing, combined with artificial intelligence, is the next realm of computing. It’s here today. These two technologies are so closely linked, it feels awkward to speak about them in isolation.
These two technologies feed off one another and will be responsible for the exponential growth in technological breakthroughs that have already begun.
I couldn’t be more excited for what’s to come. Prepare to hit warp speed.
We have so much to look forward to…
Jeff
The Bleeding Edge is the only free newsletter that delivers daily insights and information from the high-tech world as well as topics and trends relevant to investments.
The Bleeding Edge is the only free newsletter that delivers daily insights and information from the high-tech world as well as topics and trends relevant to investments.
