The development of quantum computing technology is happening faster than we think. How should IT leaders start the quantum conversation in their organizations if it’s not viable for business use just yet? In this exclusive interview, Raul Palacios, President at OneQuantum (Chile Chapter) and Multicloud Solutions Director at Gtd, shares valuable insights on the current and future business landscape of quantum computing, the relationship between AI and quantum computing, and why business leaders must jump on the quantum train before it’s too late.
What is the current landscape for quantum computing?
Quantum physics is 100 years old so it’s quite new in comparison to traditional physics. Thus, a differentiation between quantum computing and classical computing. This new science creates anxiety to be understood and used in today’s technology. However, when quantum science starts to become quantum technology, it will eventually become a possible solution to different problems that cannot be tackled with the current tools we have. Quantum computing and technology will start to become more in vogue and eventually create hype and excitement. New science and technology in tools can help us achieve different results in the case of very complex problems. Nowadays, our society is growing, and we face more complex challenges every day, from climate change to economics to cybersecurity. Those come with complex problems that tend to be quite challenging for existing classical computing tools.
Would you consider 2024 as the absolute breakthrough year of quantum computing?
There is no such thing as an absolute year. But what we can see is that several companies are working on roadmaps for the development of the technology. During the last eight years, they’ve been successfully delivering on those roadmaps. We think about this absolute thing, and we go back to this binary wall, it is, or it is not.
We are in a situation like what happened at the beginning of the computing stages. Computers were mainly focused on solving very complex and expensive problems. There were no tools for day-to-day users. The adoption of computing for business happened 30 to 40 years later, depending on the maturity and location of the company.
Today, computing is everywhere compared to the early days when it was used mostly in the private sector, and eventually in the space race. So, there were no computers at home or the office. Now, everybody’s expecting to have a quantum smartphone. That is not going to happen. So, when you take this into absolute mode, we’re going to be disappointed. It’s not going to happen in the next year, but we already see that the roadmaps are delivering as expected.
Are there quantum computing use cases impacting consumers already?
There’s a long way to go for quantum technology in the B2C realm in terms of owning a quantum smartphone or laptop. However, there are many areas where analysts are seeing quantum computing produce short or mid-term value. These areas include the sciences, simulation, finance, optimization, and cybersecurity.
Cybersecurity is everyone’s business because day-to-day communication happens through an encrypted channel with standard encryptions. Those standards may be threatened by the power of quantum computing. The problem is not if, but when, and that ‘when’ has been accelerated. The industry has set this idea of a quantum breakthrough near 2030. That’s when they expect a quantum computer powerful enough to break current encryption systems.
However, these expectations are based on the estimations of Shor’s algorithm. Based on the data I saw a few months ago, there have been improvements in the approach of Shor’s on how to break up the algorithm quicker and make it a prime factorization, which is the actual mathematical tool that will eventually break the encryption. When that happens, we’re going to be in serious trouble. Every kind of transaction that happens on the Internet may be exposed.
Updating or enhancing IT security infrastructures can take easily 10 years, maybe five in the best-case scenario, putting aside quantum. For instance, if we see how the industry has progressed in upgrading to the AES encryption system, it’s been taking 30 years and counting. So, if we think there’s tool that could endanger our cybersecurity within 10 years, then we’re in trouble.
Every corporation should face quantum technologies soon. Jumping only when the technology materializes will be too late.
Although quantum computing has a long-term scope, why should business leaders make it a priority in their agendas today?
Quantum computing will have a short and long-term impact on two areas – cybersecurity and optimization.
Optimization is pretty much infused into many different businesses. In terms of cybersecurity, ransomware is a trillion-dollar business. They are very effective attacks targeting IT people. So, we get certain vectors to reduce or mitigate the impact of ransomware. Ransomware uses these kinds of encryption techniques and data capture. This is why we need better encryption and prediction systems that need to be evaluated today.
I know that it’s hard to create a quantum case because first, you need to start explaining what quantum is. Secondly, you need to create the business impact. Especially in security, it’s always difficult because some businesses are super focused on the short-term and that means they’re focusing on how they’re going to make the numbers by the end of the year, instead of focusing on cybersecurity and protection, which may be a three-year plan that does not fit with current business strategies.
It’s challenging to make quantum tangible and build a business case around it.
How can business leaders ensure that their organizations benefit from quantum computing in the long run?
Companies tend to devise their strategic plans in a period between three to five years. That’s the standard for traditional businesses today. The quantum evaluation may take a longer time. Some companies prioritize innovation, and they have teams working towards that. These teams may have a longer timeframe to work and evaluate and present future concerns. This is the main reference on how to tackle the challenges of quantum computing and quantum technologies in our current IT conversations. In the three-year timeframe, we may just start to see the quantum conversation moving forward. For those with a yearly plan, they tend to be a bit more reactive. They are not yet in the proactive mode of innovation because of budget or other reasons. So, those businesses are going to probably be the followers. Those that are more proactive and have plans to evaluate technologies may experience long-term business impact.
What is the relationship between AI and quantum computing?
That’s a very interesting topic lately. For businesses who want to move forward, they are putting these into their innovation tracks. This will help them face disruptive technologies in a different timeframe. There is a certain traction lately with AI and there’s a specific field in the matter called quantum machine learning. However, there are a lot of data-related and computing-related challenges. Maybe we have a lot of small data, but the problem is too complex for the computing capacity to resolve. These are the areas where we currently see AI and quantum computing intersect.
If you recall, just before AI we saw a lot of data science topics capturing headlines. Many data science topics have evolved to become AI-related topics. Nowadays, AI is quite oriented to processing large volumes of data. If we add the complexity of understanding that data, then we have an increased value of using quantum with AI. Quantum may help bridge the crossroads between large volumes of data. That’s why most of the ChatGPT moments are based on large language models, and then we get this idea of large data volumes. To solve complex problems, large volumes of data need to be processed. This is where quantum algorithms or quantum-inspired algorithms can help.
The latest research points to reducing the amount of data required to produce better results from the AI perspective. This is also an area where the quantum computing way of thinking may help us to improve the technology.
What quantum computing technological milestones have already made a short-term impact?
Counting qubits is fine for a specific technology approach but we should consider some other technology approaches. The quantum world is not only in superconducting qubits. We have quantum annealing and photonics, and there are many different technologies that may be measured. They have different KPIs so understanding those KPIs is important. The main milestone is achieving any kind of demonstrated success from the quantum perspective. Our current high-performance computing may produce results but if we see that, at a certain point, quantum may promise and improve performance computing and energy consumption, that’s something worth double-checking.
What are your quantum computing predictions for the upcoming year?
Companies like IBM, Inq, and D-Wave Systems have been delivering roadmaps and are aggressively working to accelerate quantum. There is also a growing interest in quantum from a broader audience. A few years ago, the quantum community was small, but it’s been growing very fast. More IT and business leaders are keen to learn more about quantum.
That’s a call to action for the quantum people. We need to translate what is required for our newer audiences. That’s a challenge because, in the next 12 months, we’re going to see more non-quantum people jumping into the technology. Existing quantum conversations were super technical, talking about qubits and physics, and it’s very hard to digest. Quantum experts need to figure out how to translate the value of the technology for business leaders.
Sectors that can benefit from quantum computing the most are finance, telco, and retail. Most private companies are investing and researching related current technologies, security, process optimization, and energy consumption. There will be improved quantum processor units (QPUs) that may be on the same track as traditional CPUs and GPUs. There will be improvements in how we develop algorithms and how the technology integrates into existing system infrastructures.
What are immediate things business leaders can do to get ahead of quantum technology?
It needs to be on the radar for innovation.
Companies need to be given support to participate in quantum conferences and events. There are a lot of clever people making statements and clarifying what can and cannot be done. It’s also getting external support. Some companies may not be able to afford to hire experts, but they may afford to hire consultants to help them get on track. You don’t need to develop your own quantum computer; you can already consume the technology available using cloud computing. Anyone can use a credit card and start consuming and testing quantum ideas right now.
*The interview answers have been edited for length and clarity.