Quantum computing current progress and related stocks

Quantum computing

Introduction to Quantum Computing

A quick briefing

A quantum computer is a physical device that follows the laws of quantum mechanics, performs high-speed calculations, stores and processes quantum information. Because it uses overlapping qubits (also known as qubits), 0 and 1 can appear “simultaneously” when processing data, completely subverting the existing principles of computer operations and inherent limitations. Therefore, its advantages are also very obvious: the processing speed is amazing, billions of times faster than traditional computers (note: the explanations in this article are just basic concepts, the real technology involved in quantum computers is much more profound than this).

The IDC report predicts that the global quantum computing market will grow from $412 million in 2020 to $8.6 billion in 2027, with a six-year compound annual growth rate of more than 50%.

Extremely difficult to make, let alone commercialization

We must take into account various commercially available and useful features such as ease of control and ensuring state maintenance and durability, in order to create a truly practical volume computing solution. Many companies claim to have found a way to manufacture large quantities of solid-state quantities, that is, Transmon manufacturing technology. Because this technology is similar to the existing chip manufacturing technology, many major players in the market (including Alphabet, International Business Machines’ Rigetti) chose to use Transmon technology; however, it is not easy to maintain the state because it needs to be controlled in an ultra-low temperature state. Transmon technology requires a complicated dilution refrigeration system, but another trapped-ion technology only requires liquid helium refrigeration.

Three phases

According to Pan Jianwei, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in mainland China, the development of quantum computing has three stages:

  • The goal of the first stage is to achieve the superiority of quantum computing, that is, the computing power of quantum computers for specific problems exceeds that of supercomputers. This goal has been achieved by the United States, China and Canada.
  • The goal of the second stage is to realize a dedicated quantum simulator, which can be applied to specific problems such as combinatorial optimization quantum chemistry, machine learning, etc. to guide material design, drug development, etc. To reach this stage, according to current estimates, it will take 5 to 10 Years is the main research task in the current academic circles.
  • The third stage is to build a programmable universal quantum computer based on the realization of quantum error correction. Due to technical difficulties, it is not yet clear when a universal quantum computer will be realized, and the academic community generally believes that it will take 15 to 20 years, or even longer.

The difficulties need to face

Impossible without hardware

80% of global investment is invested in quantum computer hardware itself, hardware is the current investment focus, and software ecology may account for less than 20%. The biggest challenge for the quantum computing industry now is hardware, and the scale of qubits is too small. However, if the application is really needed, it is necessary to increase the number of qubits on a large scale while ensuring the quality, so it will soon be pushed to the scale of hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, or even millions of qubits. The reason why body investment is relatively hot.

The main obstacle at this moment

According to Intel, the current development of quantitative computing still encounters the following major obstacles to be overcome:

  • The measurement bit error correction method ensures that the measurement bit has a sufficient life span, and the life span must be long enough that it can complete some meaningful calculations. This is like the artificial solar fusion. The fusion must be found to have a long enough lifespan and can be controlled by humans before commercialization is possible.
  • Need the local control of the measurement of qubit, rather than through the remote connection to control.
  • The arrangement on the path, that is, how to put the measurement qubit into a physical measurement bit system.
  • The connection between the measurement qubits is to connect the measurement qubits to form a relatively large-scale system.

Participating vendors

At present, the major commercial quantum computer manufacturers in the world are in North America. Their progress, respective development, and milestones reached are as follows:

Companyticker:Achievements, progress, milestone
Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) Unlisted In October 2021, the Chinese superconducting sub-computing research team built a 66-bit programmable superconducting sub-computing prototype “Zuchongzhi”, which is ten million times faster than the fastest supercomputer in the past. In 2020, we will build the “Nine Chapters” of the 76-photon quantum computing prototype, which will deal with the Gaussian Bose sampling problem one trillion times faster than the supercomputer.
Quantum CTek Shanghai 688027Quantum communication product development, production and technical services, including finance, electronics, communications and other fields, participated in the technical services of the Beijing-Shanghai high-speed railway quantum secret communication trunk and the “Mozi” quantum satellite. The world’s first listed quantum computing company.
CIQ Tek Unlisted A startup company established by the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS)’s Superconducting Quantitative Research Team
Origin Quantum Unlisted A startup company established by the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS)’s Superconducting Quantitative Research Team
Turing QuantumUnlisted The first company in China to commercialize optical quantum chips and optical quantum computers
BaiduBIDUBaidu announces its first quantum computer in Aug. 2022
SpinQUnlisted In November 2023, it successfully delivered a independently developed and produced superconducting quantum chip to a Middle Eastern scientific research institution.
D-WaveQBTSBy 2020, customers have built more than 200 applications with D-Wave’s system.
In 2015, Alphabet and NASA adopted D-Wave measurement computers, achieving performance that was 100 million times faster than traditional computers.
Notable customers include Volkswagen, Alphabet, NASA, Lockheed Martin, Accenture, DENSO, ISC, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Los Alamos National Laboratory.
Founded in 1999, it is the world’s first commercial supplier of quantum computers and a developer of quantum computing service software.
AlphabetGOOGL and GOOGSpin off its quantum computing unit as a separated company Sandbox AQ
In 2021, it was announced that a quantum computer with an error correction mechanism would be built within 10 years.
In 2019, he published a paper in the journal Nature, claiming that the Sycamore quantum computer with 52 qubits had achieved quantum supremacy, but Intel and International Business Machines immediately complained that the Alphabet were excessively exaggerated.
In 2018, the 72-qubit processor was announced and the quantum algorithm framework Criq was open sourced.
IntelINTLThe main partner is QuTech in the Netherlands.
In 2021, it was announced that Intel’s low temperature control chip, Horse Ridge, can control electronic components to operate with high precision in low temperature environments.
It can support 17 qubits in 2017.
International Business MachinesIBMOsprey launched in Oct 2022, support 433 qubits, 3 times as many as the Eagle in 2021.
Roadmap announced in May 2022, more than 4,000 qubit systems to be unveiled in 2025
Nov 2021, announced the Eagle 127 qubit chip, which will replace traditional computers in some applications within two years
In 2019, the world’s first independent quantum computer, IBM Q System One, was developed. It is currently rented out on the Internet, and it will not be ruled out for sale in the future.
It can support 20 qubits in 2019.
IQMUnlisted Superconducting quantum computing company from Europe
Oxford Quantum CircuitsUnlisted UK government sponsored, will launch first quantum computer
RigettiRGTIClaimed own UK first quantum computer, Go public in 2021 through a SPAC merger.
IonQIONQIonQ’s $2bn SPAC merger with dMY in 2021, Customers including Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Hyundai Motor Company, and Kia Corporation
Honeywell HONIn 2021, acquired Cambridge Quantum Computing, create world largest Quantum Computing company
In 2020, after investing in Zapata and Cambridge to cooperate in the development of quantitative algorithms and software, and launching the Model H0, a quantitative computer, Honeywell will launch a more powerful System Model H1.
In 2020, a mass computer will be successfully manufactured using the off-trap technology, and through Microsoft Azure.
The cloud service provides user access and claims to be the most powerful commercial subcomputer to date. JPMorgan Chase will become its first customer.
Quantum ComputingQUBTIt offers Qatalyst application accelerator to create and execute quantum-ready applications on conventional computers, while being ready to run on quantum computers as well as provides multiple quantum processing units, partners including DWave, Rigetti, and IonQ.
Xanadu quantum technology Unlisted In 2022, Xanadu’s quantum computer Borealis can complete operations related to Gaussian Boson sampling (GBS) in 36 microseconds. Today’s most powerful supercomputers take 9,000 years to perform the same task
MicrosoftMSFTIn 2020, the cloud quantum service Azure Quantum will be opened to all customers.
In 2019, the cloud quantum service Azure Quantum was released for developers to study; the Q# compiler of the quantum development kit was announced as open source, and a quantum simulator was also launched.
In 2017, the Q# compiler of the quantum development kit was launched.
The “Station Q” laboratory was established in 2005.
Amazon AWSAMZNIn 2022, Amazon Cloud Technology announced the establishment of Amazon Center for Quantum Networking, CQN
In 2022, an eight-qubit quantum processing unit based on superconducting qubit technology, named Lucy’s Quantum Processing Unit (QPU), will be launched.
Amazon Braket is a AWS fully managed service , support hybrid quantum-classical workloads, gives customers access to quantum hardware from three startups: D-Wave Systems, IonQ, and
Rigetti Computing.
nVidiaNVDANVDA provides cuQuantum, a software development kit that contains optimized libraries and tools for accelerating quantum computing workflow

Who exactly is the current leader?

IBM is leading the development of global superconducting quantum computing technology. Judging from the current development trend, it is difficult for other superconducting quantum computing companies including Alphabet to surpass in a short time. IBM also represents the United States in the field of superconducting quantum computers. international status.

Where is its value?

Quantitative calculations can solve many problems that cannot be solved by conventional calculations in the past, such as material simulation, pharmaceutical simulation, and encryption algorithms in the post-quantity era. The most optimistic estimate is that it will take at least 10 years before the actual commercial use of mass calculations can be achieved. Even if it enters the commercial phase – that is to say, most of the existing algorithms are still It is still valid and will not make traditional calculation methods, such as deep learning, artificial intelligence, obsolete. For your information you can refer to my previous blog post “Artificial intelligence investment trap

It seems that measuring computers can definitely subvert the existing calculation methods that have been used for decades. Even the most recent supercomputers are just pediatrics in front of them. However, I would like to remind investors that, like supercomputers, measurement computers are very expensive, have limited uses, and have a small market – they will not be good investment targets. Otherwise, the world’s most famous Cray Inc. supercomputer company would not go bankrupt and acquired by HP Enterprise (ticker: HPE), because people who can afford it are very rare. In Taiwan, apart from unverifiable intelligence units, there is only the Central Meteorological Bureau.

How big is the otential market?

IDC has predicted that the global quantum computing market will grow from $412 million in 2020 to $8.6 billion in 2027, with a compound annual growth rate of 50.9%.

Closing words

The following points are what investors need to know about the development of quantum computing so far:

  • The most important thing is that there must be a “physical machine” that can be popularized and practically used! and to make everything come true. The development of quantum computer hardware is the top priority. Without a physical quantum computer, everything is empty talk.
  • If quantum computing can be popularized and realized, it may indeed subvert the current computing methods; including the computers currently in use, the design methods of program codes, and the way of thinking in the computer technology industry will all change.
  • Quantum computing is still very far away from the practical stage.
  • The currently proven application fields include encryption, ultra-high-speed computing, communication, and the development of new biotechnology drugs. With the development of quantum computer hardware, unprecedented breakthroughs will be obtained.
Quantum computing
credit: finbold

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