What a quantum computing world map looks like

Another RES node, Supercomputing Center of Galicia (CESGA), It is also in the process of producing the first quantum computer in southern Europe. With an investment of €13.9 million and scheduled for September 15 this year, this computer will position this center as a major player in the region. “The quantum computer will make the Master in Quantum that we will obtain this year even more attractive, and will also work on use cases with Galician industries, as well as identifying opportunities, as well as attracting and retaining our talent,” details Luis Orosa, Director of CESGA.

In addition to these computers financed by European public investments, there is cooperation between the public and private sectors such as the Basque government and IBM, which on March 24 presented the Basque Quantum Alliance, a strategic partnership developed with the three provincial councils. Basque Quantum will represent a direct investment of €120 million until 2028 in quantum-related initiatives, the most important of which is the creation of… IBM-Euskadi Quantum Center, which will house the IBM Quantum System One. Vizcaya will lead the industrial and commercial space, with agreements with private companies that so far include BBVA, CIE Automotive, Inditex, Petronor-Repsol and soon Gestamp.

Quantum computing race

According to McKinsey & Company’s Quantum Technology Monitor report released in June 2022, the European Union has the highest concentration of quantum-related talent and, along with China, is the region that invests the most public funds. But the market is led by North America, which is home to 10 of the top 12 manufacturers, and the US represents the largest investment in quantum computing. According to an April 2023 McKinsey & Company report, the economic outlook for quantum computing by 2035 is estimated at between $620 billion and $1.27 trillion for just four industries: chemicals, finance, life sciences, and automobiles.

“Quantum computing is one of the most competitive sectors in the world, comparable to the struggle between the United States and the Soviet Union to conquer space in the 1960s. The first government to master this technology will have an advantage over the rest, as it will have the ability to better predict, simulate, and analyze a greater number of scenarios, whether it is the development of a new drug, a natural disaster, or “the next financial crisis,” explains Professor Sanchez Toral.

Before the Spanish centres, other institutions in European countries already have quantum computers. This is the case in the United Kingdom, where Oxford Quantum Circuits (OQC) and Cambridge Quantum (CQ), which has been renamed Quantinum since its merger with Honeywell Quantity Solutions are based in 2021, focusing on superconducting circuits, as well as “software” and quantum cybersecurity, respectively.

Within the European Union, in addition to the six countries selected by the EU, including Spain that have BSC-CNS, there are currently five quantum computers. Alpine Quantum Technologies (AQT), in Austria, which explores quantum computing using trapped ions. in France, Pascal Builds quantum processors based on neutral atoms. While in the Netherlands, the company QTechThe company, linked to the University of Delft, is also developing a quantum computer with support from Intel.

IQM Quantum Computers, also based in the European Union and founded by Finnish universities, builds devices using qubits implemented in superconducting circuits. Since 2019, it has been listed as a Finnish-German company after partnering with a startup based in Frankfurt (Germany) that makes quantum computing “software” for finance, insurance and energy. Something similar happens with As much as brilliance It is an Australian-German venture capital-backed company providing quantum diamond accelerators, with partnerships in the US, Canada, Europe and Asia Pacific.

Many multinational companies have also landed on the continent. One of these companies is IBM, which has a quantum computer in Zurich (Switzerland), As she has Google, which has also installed one at Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, the German National Research Council, Just outside Stuttgart.

Other tech giants, e.g Rigetti, Intel, Xanadu, and Alibaba; Companies like IonQ, Quantware, and D-Wave; Likewise, China’s USTC University or Japan’s RIKEI University are also pursuing similar goals in countries such as Japan, Korea, Singapore or Australia.

The global competition to master transformative technology is still in its infancy. “If we draw an analogy with ordinary computers, we are in the 1940s and 1950s, when the transistor did not yet exist,” says Professor Sanchez Toral. “The path to universal, fault-tolerant quantum computing is as challenging as it is stimulating. It requires a massive research and funding effort so that, at some point, a scientific discovery in some laboratory opens the doors to this new paradigm and all the promised possibilities become a reality.”