The US military has launched an effort to determine who may be able to build a truly useful quantum computer within a decade, and what it may be good for.
There are more than six dozen companies currently building quantum computers, but it is far from clear which of them will eventually produce devices that have a concrete impact on American industries and the economy. The US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has now started a programme to find out.
“We turned the question on its head,” says , programme manager for DARPA’s Quantum Benchmarking Initiative (QBI). Instead of asking which research team currently has the best-performing quantum computer, he and his colleagues set out to ask what sort of quantum computing systems stand a good chance of changing the world in the future. If the QBI programme is successful, the quantum computers built in its aftermath could revolutionise several industries, from the design of advanced materials to synthesis of new catalysts, says at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
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Earlier this month, that 15 companies from North America, Europe and Australia had been selected to enter QBI’s first stage, and it expects to reveal three more soon. The companies range from computing giants like IBM and Hewlett Packard Enterprise to start-ups such as Colorado’s Quantinuum and Quebec-based , all of which propose different ways of building quantum bits, or qubits, which are the crucial component of quantum computers.
QBI will take place in three stages, at each of which DARPA’s evaluators will eliminate companies that they determine won’t be able to build quantum computers with a practical value that exceeds their cost by 2033. Altepeter says that almost 300 experts, recruited from national laboratories and leading universities in the US, will be involved in the process and examine possible points of failure for each company both in terms of physics and engineering.
In the early stages, each company’s research teams will have to address a list of 60 questions addressing technical issues about the materials science and fundamental physics their devices rely on, and also about their long-term plans as they relate to supply chains and hiring of a quantum workforce. Later, the QBI team will conduct hands-on testing of all devices, focusing on benchmarks that may be different than those that the companies themselves have been using to highlight the performance of their quantum computers.
Success will be defined by benchmarks that can be clearly compared to the performance of traditional supercomputers, to make the advantage of going quantum evident, says Altepeter.
Participating companies must accept some sharing of details of their technology with DARPA. However, should they excel at the benchmarks, companies also stand to benefit by receiving a rigorous vote of confidence in their approach, which should bolster their credibility and allow for future growth. Taking part in the QBI is “evidence that the technology we’ve been developing holds tremendous potential and will ultimately deliver useful quantum computing in the medium term”, said at Nord Quantique in a statement.
This programme shows that the US defence community is getting more serious about quantum computing – a move that helps legitimise the field, says at the quantum computing and sensing start-up Infleqtion, which is not involved in QBI. “The programme’s team will have unparalleled access to a variety of qubit types, which will enable DARPA to make wise decisions about which technologies are closest to economically valuable applications,” he says. at the quantum software company Phasecraft, which is also not involved with QBI, says that the level of rigour involved in the QBI programme “has the potential to transform the field of quantum computing”.
The overall task, however, remains formidable. In addition to the lack of scientific consensus about the best uses for quantum computers and the many competing hardware designs, the QBI process will also have to navigate a complex geopolitical climate full of trade restrictions, all while competitors like China fund their own quantum computing initiatives. “This programme won’t solve geopolitical questions, but every quarter, it will give us new information that policy-makers can use,” says Altepeter.
