We share key takeaways from the conference, focusing on developments in error correction, the importance of quantum networking for scaling QC, and the vital role of collaboration in the future of quantum computing.
Last week, Nu Quantum sent a strong delegation at Q2B Silicon Valley 2024, the quantum industry’s biggest business conference. It was an exciting and busy week, our CEO Carmen Palacios-Berraquero gave a well-received plenary talk sharing the company’s work on enabling distributed quantum computing and our Non-Executive Board Director Bob Sutor presented his views on the state of the quantum computing industry and recommendations for moving forward. And, the rest of our team (Coral Westoby, Ed Wood, John Jarman, Nicolas Sanchez, Simone Eizagirre Barker) had a fantastic time representing Nu Quantum at our stand in the exhibition hall alongside other UK quantum companies as part of the Department of Business and Trade’s delegation to the conference.
We’ve entered the era of logical qubits, but there’s still a long way to go
Google and Quantinuum have staked leading positions in quantum error correction, with exciting announcements from both companies last week.
Quantinuum has gone wide, betting that a full-stack design approach to error correction will deliver scalable advantage. They demonstrated a 50-qubit state exceeding 98% fidelity by using error-correction techniques, the largest claimed by any company to date. By building generalist devices with all-to-all connectivity, they have also shown entangled states that improve on physical qubit error rates for several types of error-correction codes and made steps towards fault tolerant universality with code switching.
Google has instead focused on lowering error rates, with their second-generation chip Willow demonstrating one logical qubit with error correction operating far below threshold, for the first time, building on the operation of below-threshold operation with the last-generation Sycamore chip. This demonstration shows that it is possible to continue to lower errors as chips are scaled up, and establishes a new narrative, where the cost of a Utility-Scale TeraQuop system will be driven by the QEC ‘lambda’ parameter you can achieve. This parameter describes the advantage provided by error-correction, and Google is the first company to highlight this parameter for their system. If Google is able to deliver a continued suppression of physical errors whilst scaling to millions of qubits and developing full stack control remains to be seen, but the progress so far is compelling!
Complementary developments on both fronts, that is increasing both the quantity and quality of error-corrected qubits, will be necessary to scale to utility.
Networking will play a crucial role in scaling to utility scale
There is growing consensus on the need for modularity in large scale quantum computers, justified by appeals to history of classical computing, evidence of stagnation in single-core qubit numbers, and theoretical work supporting the possibility of using noisy interconnects. However, there remains relatively little consensus on how modularity and interconnection might be achieved, with superconducting qubit companies proposing roadmaps involving modular but not necessarily photonic networks, and many different approaches to the role, types, and implementation of quantum memories in such architectures.
Nu Quantum remains the only company that offers a qubit-photon interface alongside our networking hardware, a critical element that improves the rate and fidelity of the qubit’s interface to a network to make scalable interconnects feasible.
The future of quantum will be collaborative
Q2B featured several contributions from the quantum strategy groups of various nations such as the Netherlands, Denmark, and the UK. Cross-border collaboration came up as a recurring theme in these presentations, with a recognition that quantum computing is a common goal with shared benefits, and a huge task that needs extensive cooperation to solve. As quantum technologies, not just computing but also sensing, networks, and imaging, move out of the laboratory and into companies, the importance of supporting an industry that can supply large-scale projects like the UK’s National Quantum Computing Centre becomes paramount. Simon Benjamin, Professor of Quantum Technologies at the University of Oxford, presented the important groundwork achieved by the UK’s quantum innovation and investment strategy over the last decade, highlighting its contributions to training a quantum-ready workforce. We couldn’t agree more – in fact, several of our employees conducted their postgraduate studies at the UK’s Quantum Hubs.
Special thanks to the British Consulate-General in San Francisco and UK Quantum for promoting this cross-pollination and to the rest of UK organisations who joined us on the UK pavilion: OQC, Quantum Software Lab, Qruise, and Harwell Quantum/National Quantum Computing Centre (NQCC).
Where next?
The next edition of Q2B will take place in Tokyo on May 15-16, 2025. In the meantime, you will be able to find our team at SPIE Photonics West in San Francisco in January 2025, where you can catch our Product Manager Simone Eizagirre Barker at SPIE’s Celebration of Women in Optics Programme on January 26th, and our CEO Carmen Palacios-Berraquero at Quantum West on January 29th. See you soon!
