Microsoft on Wednesday announced Majorana 1, first quantum calculation system.
The achievement occurred after the company spent almost two decades of research in this field, but Microsoft claims that building Majorana 1 required it to create a completely new state of matter, which is called a topological state.
The Microsoft quantum chip uses eight topological cubits using an indu arsen, which is semiconductor and aluminum, which is a superconduct.
“The difficulty of developing appropriate materials to create exotic particles and the related state of topological matter is why most of the quantum efforts focused on other types of cubites,” said the company in blog Wednesday.
Understanding the topological matter and making it work on the construction of a computer system, required the atom atom to spray through the atom, that the materials would be perfect, the company wrote on the blog.
“Ironically, that's why we need a quantum computer – because understanding these materials is extremely difficult,” said Kryst Svore, Microsoft Technical Fellow on the blog. “Thanks to the scaled quantum computer, we will be able to predict materials with even better properties to build the next generation of quantum computers outside the scale.”
AND new paper In the journal Nature describes the system in detail.
Technologists believe that quantum computers can one day effectively solve problems that would be taxed, if not impossible for classic computers. Today's computers use bits that can be turned on or off, while quantum computers use quantum or cubic bits that can operate simultaneously in both states.
Google AND IBM also developed quantum processors, as well as smaller companies Ionq AND Calculations reject.
Microsoft will not allow clients to use the Majorana 1 system via Azure Public Cloud, as it plans to do it with a non -standard artificial intelligence system, Maia 100. Instead, Majorana 1 is a step towards the purpose of a million cubits on a chip, after extensive physics studies.
Instead of relying on Taiwan Semiconductor Or another production company, Microsoft produces elements of Majorana 1 in the USA, which is possible because the work is developing on a small scale.
“We want to get to several hundred cubits before we start talking about commercial reliability,” said CNBC Jason Zander, Microsoft executive vice president.
In the meantime, the company will cooperate with national laboratories and universities in research using Majorana 1.
Despite focusing on research, investors are fascinated by quantum.
IonQ shares increased by 237% in 2024, and Rigetti gained almost 1,500%. They both generated a total of $ 14.8 million of the third quarter revenues. Further profits He came in JanuaryAfter the release of Microsoft Blog post A statement that 2025 is “a year to become a ready quantum.”
The Microsoft Azure Quantum Cloud service, which allows programmers to experiment with programs and algorithms, offers access to Ionq and Rigetti systems. Zander said that it is possible that Microsoft quantum chip can become available via Azure before 2030.
“There is a lot of speculation that for decades from this,” he said. “We think it's more like years.”
Instead of existing as an independent category, quantum calculations can ultimately increase other parts of Microsoft. For example, there is an AI Microsoft activity that has an annual revenue rate exceeds $ 13 billion. Zander said that quantum computers can be used to build data used to train AI models.
“Now you can ask you to come up with a new molecule, come up with a new medicine, something that would really be to do before,” said Zander.