Google announced on Monday that it has solved a major quantum computing difficulty with a new generation of chips, completing a computation in five minutes that would have taken a classical computer longer time than the universe had existed.
Alphabet’s Google is pursuing quantum computing because it promises computation speeds significantly quicker than the current quickest systems, much like other IT behemoths like Microsoft and International Business Machines (IBM). Google expects quantum computers may one day address problems in health, battery chemistry, and artificial intelligence that are beyond the capabilities of current computers, even though the math problem solved by the company’s Santa Barbara, California quantum lab does not have any commercial implications.
