IBM Partners With Global Universities To Develop Quantum-centric Supercomputer

(RTTNews) - IBM (IBM) announced a 10-year, $100 million partnership with the University of Tokyo and the University of Chicago to develop a quantum-centric supercomputer powered by 100,000 qubits.

Quantum-centric supercomputing is an entirely new, and as of now, unrealized, era of high-performance computing. A 100,000-qubit system would serve as a foundation to address some of the world's most pressing problems that even the most advanced supercomputers of today may never be able to solve, IBM said in a statement.

IBM intends to expand the partnerships to include Argonne National Laboratory and Fermilab National Accelerator Laboratory, both of which are members of the Chicago Quantum Exchange and home to two respective Department of Energy quantum hubs.

The two laboratories offer capabilities and expertise that can facilitate delivering the technologies envisaged in the race to build a quantum-centric supercomputer.

Over the next decade, IBM plans to work with university partners and its worldwide quantum ecosystem to evolve how its quantum processors can be connected via quantum interconnects. The work will aim to enable high-efficiency, high-fidelity inter-processor quantum operations and a reliable, flexible, and affordable system component infrastructure to allow scaling to 100,000 qubits.