D-Wave CEO says the age of ‘quantum supremacy’ may already be here

D-Wave CEO says the age of ‘quantum supremacy’ may already be here

• In today’s CEO Daily: Sharon Goldman talks about quantum computing with D-Wave CEO Alan Baratz.
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• Analyst notes from Panmure Liberum on Germany’s stimulus package, JPMorgan on AI in China, Convera on the declining U.S. dollar, Goldman Sachs on inflation.
• Plus: All the news and watercooler chat from Fortune.

Good morning. Quantum computing has long been touted as having the potential to solve problems in minutes that would take today’s best supercomputers thousands or even millions of years to crack. While that may sound like a dream to many CEOs, as the quantum industry has grown over the past decade, so too has the debate over its ability. Does the tech offer a chance to provide companies with real-world breakthroughs or are claims of “quantum supremacy,” and its vast superiority to traditional computing, just hype?

The quantum question hit new heights in January at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, when Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said “very useful” quantum computers are likely 15 to 30 years away, leading to a stock tumble in the space. “I was quite disappointed in him,” said Alan Baratz, CEO of quantum company D-Wave. “He just kind of lumped all quantum together.”

In a sign that Huang wanted to make amends with the industry, Nvidia’s March GTC conference featured the first “Quantum Day”—and D-Wave’s Baratz participated in one of the panels. But while Huang may have wanted to soothe rattled investors, quantum stocks still fell after the event—including D-Wave. 

I had the chance to sit down with Baratz as the company (which was founded in 1999 and went public via a SPAC merger in 2022), made its own quantum supremacy claim. It published a new paper in the journal Science in mid-March, which showed it had completed a virtual experiment on a quantum computer to see how a material’s atoms and molecules would behave in the real world. It said a traditional computer could not have completed the simulation. 

I came away from our conversation surprised by the complex nuances of the quantum computing debate. Here are three takeaways for business leaders:

• One form of quantum has already become commercialized. D-Wave focuses on a kind of quantum computing called “annealing” that works well for optimization problems like determining vehicle routes and employee scheduling. Clients include Japan’s NTT Docomo and Canada’s Pattison Food Group.
  
• Quantum and AI will work together for companies. Baratz says that quantum and AI often solve different parts of the same problem. For example, generative AI might predict future product demand, while quantum could optimize the supply chain to meet that demand. A quantum computer could also potentially train AI models more quickly.
  We won’t see the full promise of quantum for a while. Most quantum companies focus on more universal quantum technology that is “gate-based,” where complex commands are run in a sequence, Baratz explained. While this can potentially solve a broader range of problems than D-Wave’s annealing, it is also very sensitive to errors and will likely take many years to commercialize.
  More news below.
  Contact CEO Daily via Diane Brady at diane.brady@fortune.com

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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