Google's Willow Quantum Chip: Breakthrough Performance Sparks Multiverse Debate

Can Google's quantum chip prove you're living in a multiverse?

Google's quantum chip, Willow, has sparked discussions about the existence of a multiverse after reportedly solving a complex computation in just five minutes. This task, which would take modern supercomputers around 10 septillion years to complete, was highlighted in a study published in the journal Nature. The breakthrough is the culmination of efforts from the Google Quantum AI team and suggests that quantum computing may operate across parallel dimensions. Hartmut Neven, founder of the Google Quantum AI team, stated that the chip's rapid performance supports the idea that quantum computation may occur in multiple parallel universes. This notion aligns with theories previously established by physicist David Deutsch. Although quantum mechanics and multiverse concepts have been linked before, this claim is significant as no major tech company has explicitly associated its advancements with the multiverse theory in such bold terms. The Willow chip utilizes qubits, which differ from traditional bits by existing in a superposition of states, allowing for more complex problem-solving capabilities at much higher speeds. Unlike classical computers that operate solely with 0s and 1s, qubits can be in multiple states simultaneously, enhancing the power of quantum computing. Neven emphasized Willow's advancements, noting its reduced error rates attributed to a higher number of qubits, which traditionally would increase complication and errors. Professor Winfried Hensinger, director of the Sussex Centre for Quantum Technologies, lauded Willow's achievement, calling it a "very important milestone" in quantum computing. He stated that this result bolsters confidence that humanity will eventually construct practical quantum computers with significant applications in diverse fields, including drug discovery and cybersecurity. While Willow's capabilities are impressive, some experts caution against drawing conclusions about the multiverse. Astrophysicist Ethan Siegel argued that the success of quantum computers does not necessarily validate the existence of parallel dimensions, stating, "You can have quantum mechanics work just fine...without introducing even one parallel universe." This perspective highlights ongoing debates within the scientific community regarding the implications of quantum computing breakthroughs. In response to Google's announcement, concerns were raised about the nature of the computation that Willow completed. German physicist Sabine Hossenfelder pointed out that the specific problem solved by the chip -- producing a random distribution -- has no practical application. She indicated that while Google might claim their computation is astonishing, the actual task has been framed in a way to emphasize its difficulty for classical computers. Additionally, Hossenfelder commented that Google's approach appears similar to a previous achievement where a lower number of qubits (about 50) was used to make similar claims. The current challenge, according to Hossenfelder, remains that practical applications of quantum computing may require approximately one million qubits -- vastly beyond the capabilities of the Willow chip, which features 100 qubits. This skepticism reflects a broader pattern observed following Google's announcement of "quantum supremacy" in 2019, which ignited a dispute with rival IBM. IBM researchers contended that Google had overstated its claims and asserted that the computations in question could be performed on classical systems within a reasonable timeframe. This rivalry has fueled continued scrutiny of Google's assertions regarding office capabilities in quantum computing and their significance.

Google Makes Multiverse a Reality, Really? | AI Insights & Analysis

Google's new 'Willow' chip, which indirectly proposes the idea of a multiverse, may not be as practical as we thought. Amid Google's claim that its newly launched Willow, the state-of-the-art quantum computing chipset, can reduce errors exponentially when scaling with more qubits, critics have questioned the tech giant's bold claims. Google even said that their solution would take a "septillion years" on traditional machines. It sparked discussions among the scientific community about the possibility of parallel universes or multiverses. The 105-cubit quantum chipset Willow is claimed to have practical applications in areas like drug discovery, battery designs, and fusion energy. Steve Jurvetson, the San Francisco-based venture capitalist, said in a post on X that Google's claim of quantum supremacy was based on a flawed benchmark and that it has no real-world applications. "Google's repeated quantum supremacy claims are based on RCS, a contrived benchmark that they admit "has no known real-world applications," Jurveson posted. "It's essentially a quantum computer simulating itself." Besides, German physicist Sabine Hossenfelder took to X and said the tech giant's claims were not true, suggesting that the achievement might not be as impactful as it was projected. "The particular calculation in question is to produce a random distribution. The result of this calculation has no practical use," Hossenfelder said. She further pointed out that Google had specifically chosen a problem that had been formally proven to be challenging for conventional computers due to its reliance on heavy entanglement. Amidst all the criticism, Willow has its share of positive moments. Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, and Sundar Pichai, Google CEO, indicated a potential collaboration for quantum clusters in space with Starship soon after the chipset launch on Monday. What Google is showcasing is essentially the same as the one performed back in 2019 on their roughly 54-qubit chip. The company had insisted that machines performed the target computation in 200 seconds. From measurements and experiments, they determined that it would take the world's fastest supercomputer 10,000 years to produce a similar output. The current claim has scaled up from 54 to 105-qubit chip, and the statement, "It performed a computation in under five minutes that would take one of today's fastest supercomputers 1025 or 10 septillion years." The earlier claim of "quantum supremacy" was met with scepticism from IBM shortly after its announcement, with the company saying, "We argue that an ideal simulation of the same task can be performed on a classical system in 2.5 days and with far greater fidelity." Three years later, in 2022, Google's claim was reportedly replicated by scientists in China in a few hours with ordinary processors. Hossenfelder also notes a pattern in the quantum computing field: grand claims about 'quantum utility,' 'quantum advantage,' or 'quantum supremacy' often lose their lustre when alternative methods are discovered to achieve similar results using conventional computing, leaving the promises of transformative breakthroughs unrealised. Such developments in quantum computing are not just the hold of the US but also being powered by China. As reported by AIM, China recently launched its advanced 504-qubit superconducting quantum computer, 'Tianyan-504'. This computer crosses the 500-qubit threshold and competes directly with international platforms like IBM. Cohesively, in a recent interview, Kai-Fu Lee, a Taiwanese computer scientist, entrepreneur, and author of 'AI Superpower,' said that China will catch up with the US in AI capabilities. However, in terms of AI startups, many are deciding not to sell chips to China. But China has not given up and has managed to demonstrate a stable quantum key distribution (QKD)-based communication network spanning over 4,600 km -- the largest and most advanced QKD network globally to date. Following that, IBM has made major progress in becoming a leader in quantum computing. And India is not behind. Dr Ajai Chowdhry, the co-founder of HCL and chairman of the mission governing board for India's National Quantum Mission, said on his LinkedIn, "India must urgently prepare itself for the quantum revolution to safeguard its security and national interests." India's largest quantum computer, with 6 to 7 superconducting qubits, is being developed at Mumbai's Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in collaboration with DRDO and TCS. The country also aims to develop 100-qubit computers within the next five years. LTIMindtree also recently announced a strategic collaboration with IBM to advance the quantum innovation ecosystem. The collaboration extended to joint projects with IIT Madras, supporting India's National Quantum Mission, and aimed at creating a strong industry-academia ecosystem. In another conversation with AIM, Dr Chowdhry, popularly known as the 'Father of Indian Hardware', highlighted the magic AI can bring to quantum computing. He referred to the AI and quantum blend as a "lethal" one. Multiple tech giants like Google and Microsoft are actively developing this combination to drive the next wave of the AI revolution. While acknowledging the scientific impressiveness of Google's latest announcement, multiple discussions point out that its practical implications are currently limited. According to estimates, a million qubits are necessary to achieve applications with everyday relevance, and we remain far from that benchmark.

Google claims quantum chip may prove existence of parallel universes

Parallel dimensions are no longer restricted to Marvel flicks. Google's cutting-edge quantum chip Willow has prompted discussions among scientists about the possibility that we may indeed be living in a multiverse, per a study published in the journal "Nature." Google physicists floated this theory after the hardware took just five minutes to solve a computational problem so complex it would have taken today's most advanced super-computers approximately 10 septillion years to crack -- more than the age of the universe, per a post on the Google blog. "It lends credence to the notion that quantum computation occurs in many parallel universes, in line with the idea that we live in a multiverse," declared the founder of the Google Quantum AI team, physicist Hartmut Neven. Parallel universes and quantum computing have been connected before, first by British physicist David Deutsch. However, this marked the first time that a major tech executive literally dubbed their achievement out of this world, er universe, Newsweek reported. Unlike traditional computers that employ 0s and 1s, quantum computers rely on infinitely smaller bits called qubits, TechCrunch reported. These process info at much higher speeds, potentially allowing them to solve complex problems that are beyond the capabilities of traditional computation machines. Along with being faster, Neven claims that Willow is also less error-prone than other quantum computers because they've paradoxically found a way to reduce the likelihood of glitches by adding more qubits. Traditionally, increasing this number was associated with increasing the probability of errors. Astrophysicist turned science writer Ethan Siegel claimed that the success of quantum computers doesn't necessarily prove the existence of a multiverse, the Daily Mail reported. "You can have quantum mechanics work just fine, both physically and mathematically, without introducing even one parallel universe," Siegel wrote in his essay for Big Think. Regardless, experts believe that Willow's capabilities are astonishing. Professor Winfried Hensinger, director of the Sussex Centre for Quantum Technologies, deemed Willow's achievement a "very important milestone" in the field of quantum computers. "This result increases our confidence further that humanity will be able to build practical quantum computers enabling some of the highly impactful applications quantum computers are known for," he said. Google believes Quantum computing has "promising applications" in various fields from discovering new drugs to cybersecurity.

Google says its new quantum chip indicates that multiple universes exist

Google on Monday announced Willow, its latest, greatest quantum computing chip. The speed and reliability performance claims Google's made about this chip were newsworthy in themselves, but what really caught the tech industry's attention was an even wilder claim tucked into the blog post about the chip. Google Quantum AI founder Hartmut Neven wrote in his blog post that this chip was so mind-boggling fast that it must have borrowed computational power from other universes. Ergo the chip's performance indicates that parallel universes exist and "we live in a multiverse." Here's the passage: Willow's performance on this benchmark is astonishing: It performed a computation in under five minutes that would take one of today's fastest supercomputers 1025 or 10 septillion years. If you want to write it out, it's 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 years. This mind-boggling number exceeds known timescales in physics and vastly exceeds the age of the universe. It lends credence to the notion that quantum computation occurs in many parallel universes, in line with the idea that we live in a multiverse, a prediction first made by David Deutsch. This drop-the-mic moment on the nature of reality was met with skepticism by some, but, surprisingly, others on the internet who profess to understand these things argued that Nevan's conclusions were more than plausible. The multiverse, while stuff of science fiction, is also an area of serious study by the founders of quantum physics. The skeptics, however, point out that the performance claims are based on the benchmark that Google itself created some years ago to measure quantum performance. That alone doesn't prove that parallel versions of you aren't running around in other universes -- just where the underlying measuring stick came from. Unlike classic digital computers that calculate based on whether a bit is a 0 or 1 (on or off), quantum computers rely on incredibly tiny qubits. These can be on/off or both (somewhere in between) and they can also tap into quantum entanglement -- a mysterious connection at the tiniest levels of the universe between two or more particles where their states are linked, no matter the distance that separates them. Quantum computers use such quantum mechanics to calculate highly complex problems that cannot currently be addressed with classic computers. The problem is that the more qubits used in the computer, the more prone to errors they are. So it's not clear yet if quantum computers will ever be reliable enough and powerful enough to live up to their hype. Google's mission with Willow was to reduce those errors, and Neven says it accomplishes that.

Google’s Willow Quantum Chip Crushes Classical Computers on a Cosmic Timescale

Willow completed a benchmark computational task, demonstrating that errors decrease exponentially as the quantum computer's qubit count increases. Google just debuted its latest quantum chip, Willow, which the tech giant claims can perform calculations in five minutes that would take the world's fastest supercomputers 10 septillion years. For reference, the universe isn't even 14 billion years oldâ€"a fraction of a fraction of that timescale. Quantum computers make their calculations in a fundamentally different way than classical supercomputers. The team's research, published today in Nature, outlines the error suppression in the Willow processor and the system's superlative performance, which the team wrote, "if scaled, could realize the operational requirements of large scale fault-tolerant quantum algorithms." Quantum devices are famously finicky; to perform their remarkable calculations they must be kept in a quantum state, which generally means a laboratory environment at near-absolute-zero temperatures. At such frosty climes, the system becomes superconductive, enabling the device to perform operations beyond the limits of classical physics. The outstanding issueâ€"or goal, depending on your framingâ€"is that quantum computers are still not capable of solving problems beyond the remit of classical computers. That's the real grail in quantum computing: a device that has practical commercial applications beyond what would make sense, or even be possible, on cutting-edge classical computers. Unlike conventional bits of information in a classical computer, which represent a value of "0" or "1", quantum bits (or qubits) can represent "0" and "1" simultaneously. In this way, the computer can crunch numbers more rapidly than traditional devices. If too many errors occur in the quantum system, however, the operation falls apart. A major part of Willow's significance is that the more qubits Willow uses, the fewer errors the system has. Errors can cause quantum operations to collapse, but instead of errors scaling up with the size of the computer, they are diminished. In a press release accompanying the announcement, Hartmut Neven, the founder and lead of Google Quantum AI, wrote that "we tested ever-larger arrays of physical qubits, scaling up from a grid of 3×3 encoded qubits, to a grid of 5×5, to a grid of 7×7 â€" and each time, using our latest advances in quantum error correction, we were able to cut the error rate in half." "In other words," Neven wrote, "we achieved an exponential reduction in the error rate." The error reduction is called "below threshold," and is a watershed moment in the quest to build future quantum computers with even fewer errors. According to a Google release, the Willow system also showed substantive advancements in real-time error correction in the systemâ€"which is to say that the computer was mitigating errors that arose while it was working on a problem. Additionally, the qubit arrays were longer-lived than individual physical qubits in the system, indicating error correction was improving the resiliency of the entire quantum chip. Willow's performance on the random circuit sampling (RCS) benchmark would take the Frontier supercomputerâ€"the fastest classical supercomputer in the world until last monthâ€"10 septillion years, much longer than the lifetime of the universe. To put that progress into scale: In 2019, Google's Sycamore quantum computer took 200 seconds to solve a problem that would take a supercomputer about 10,000 years to solve, a landmark that allowed Google to declare quantum supremacy. In July, the quantum computing company Quantinuum announced a 56-qubit system that outperformed the Sycamore processor on one of the benchmarks tested in 2019, called the linear cross entropy benchmark. Now, Google has drawn a new line in the sand. The team used the RCS benchmark, which tests a quantum computer's ability to beat classical computers in a calculation. Random circuit sampling doesn't have useful applications, but is a fundamental hurdle for quantum computers as scientists chase commercial, beyond-classical use cases. "Even if the people on Main Street don't care, it could still be very interesting," said John Preskill, the director of Caltech's Institute for Quantum Information and Matter, in a Google video accompanying the news. "I think the quantum hardware has reached a stage now where it can advance science. We can study very complex quantum systems in a regime we've never had access to before." "Quantum algorithms have fundamental scaling laws on their side, as we're seeing with RCS," Neven said. "There are similar scaling advantages for many foundational computational tasks that are essential for AI. So quantum computation will be indispensable for collecting training data that's inaccessible to classical machines, training and optimizing certain learning architectures, and modeling systems where quantum effects are important." The Google team is now approaching the third milestone in its six-step quantum roadmap towards an error-corrected quantum computer. Neven believes that commercial applications may be three to five years away, instead of multiple decades away. As is the case with a qubit's actual value, it's impossible to say for sureâ€"but the Willow result shows that real progress is being made.

Where There's a Willow, There's a Quantum Way

Community platforms were abuzz on Tuesday after Google announced a breakthrough with Willow, a quantum chip capable of beating the world's fastest supercomputers. Phrases such as "robot apocalypse," "speedrun incoming," "RIP encryption," "protect passwords," "AI/ GPU bubble" and "cosmic computing" were bandied about on X, Reddit and others. Quantum computing is regarded as the Holy Grail, vaulting the discipline into highly advanced realms that have long been theorised about. Some attributed a crash in Bitcoin prices to fears the chip would break its encryption, while others dismissed this, saying Willow was years away from practical usage. X owner Elon Musk bantered with Alphabet chief executive Sundar Pichai and lauded the discovery as "WOW" on the platform. Willow is capable of solving in five minutes, a computational problem that would take the world's fastest supercomputers 10 septillion years (roughly the age of the universe), Pichai posted on X. "This is a far more critical Chip has wide range of mission-critical use cases It beats world's fastest supercomputer But experts say real world quantum applications are years away Quantum technology can break encryptions or passwords, cryptography and financial systems Some call for cyber resilience What's Willow? development than anybody can comprehend at this point," said Ajai Chowdhry, cofounder of HCL and chairman of the National Quantum Mission of India. " This raises serious cybersecurity concerns as quantum can break everything -- from financial institutions, government systems to electrical grids. And who knows what China is already doing with it?" Quantum computing has applications in a wide range of mission-critical areas. "There are some very interesting problems, especially in the domain of quantum chemistry, that are a natural fit, (such as in) drug discovery and material sciences," said Hemant Mohapatra, partner at Lightspeed India. "An 'LLM (large language model) researcher' that guides the research direction through its data-driven reasoning and intuition engine -- paired with a quantum computer to quickly analyse the efficacy of research pathways -- could greatly accelerate fundamental research in many critical areas." Crypto Impact As the announcement was made, Bitcoin fell to $97,146 after hovering at an all-time high of $100,000 for five days. Some said this was because a scaled-up Willow could break the encryption of Bitcoin and undermine the future of decentralised finance. Others countered that Willow or any quantum computer was years away from real-world applications. "Attributing the recent price correction solely to Google's quantum computing announcement would be premature," said Vivek Gupta, chief technology officer of Indian cryptocurrency exchange CoinDCX. "That said, the quantum computing chip is still in its early stages. We are closely monitoring advancements in this field." Web3 researchers on X said cracking Bitcoin's encryption would require a quantum computer with nearly 13 million qubits to achieve decryption in 24 hours. Willow only has 105 qubits. "Future generation of quantum computers may break current algorithms," said Pradeep Aswal, chief executive of Web3 experts' body Blockchain Council. "However, by then, innovations in deep tech will ensure a decentralised tech ecosystem. The crypto industry is aware of this and proactive communities are working to mitigate this and other threats." Quantum & AGI The announcement rekindled the argument over whether aligning artificial general intelligence (AGI) and quantum computing timelines could disrupt the existing AI ecosystem and unleash a whole new computing infrastructure. AGI refers to AI that matches or exceeds human abilities. "We see Willow as an important step in our journey to build a useful quantum computer with practical applications in areas like drug discovery, fusion energy, battery design + more," Pichai said in his post on X. Lauding Google's experiment, Musk said, "I've heard from a few people now that quantum computing is showing real promise." Srikanth Velamakanni, cofounder of deep tech company Fractal.ai, described the moment as "quantum supremacy." "What Google has achieved is a milestone on quantum hardware. But, we do not currently have quantum machine algorithms which can be applied to real world applications. Therefore, the development does not have an impact on LLM development," he said.

Google claims Willow quantum chip can outpace time itself

Google has introduced its new quantum chip, Willow, which claims to outperform leading supercomputers. Unveiled on December 10, 2024, at Google's fabrication facility in Santa Barbara, the chip represents a significant advancement in quantum computing technology, according to CEO Sundar Pichai. Sundar Pichai highlighted Willow's potential to drastically reduce quantum computing errors while enabling Google to scale its use of qubits, the fundamental units of quantum computation. The chip can perform standard benchmark computations in under five minutes, a feat that would take the Frontier supercomputer, one of the fastest available, approximately 10 septillion years to complete. Hartmut Neven, founder of Google Quantum AI, described this length of time as "mind-boggling," quantifying it as a 1 followed by 25 zeros. Willow's 105 qubits provide what Google characterizes as "best-in-class performance" in quantum error correction and random circuit sampling (RCS). This performance boasts a fivefold improvement over the company's previous chip generation. Pichai noted that Willow is an important milestone in their ongoing quest to develop a large-scale quantum computer with real-world applications, including drug discovery, fusion energy, and battery design. The chip was developed at Google's state-of-the-art Santa Barbara facility, one of the few dedicated to advanced quantum computing fabrication. Pichai reflected on the twelve-year journey initiated by establishing Google AI, emphasizing the long-term vision to harness quantum mechanics for practical uses. The development team, comprised of around 300 members under Neven, remains focused on topical issues such as climate change and the challenges of fusion energy. Researchers used AI in quantum chemistry to image the unimaginable One of the landmark features of Willow is its approach to error correction. The recent research published in the journal Nature demonstrates that adding more qubits to the system can decrease computational errors, a critical advancement that has been a challenge in quantum computing for nearly three decades. Google's director of quantum hardware, Julian Kelly, described error correction as the "end game" in quantum computing, indicating that the company is making substantial progress in this pivotal area. Global attention is increasingly focused on quantum research, seen as vital for future technological advancements. Significant investments have surfaced, totaling about $20 billion globally over the past five years, with both the United States and China intensifying their efforts. The U.S. government has also imposed restrictions on the export of this sensitive technology, underscoring its strategic importance.

Willow Quantum Chip: The Future of AI, Energy, and Security?

Google has unveiled its latest quantum computing chip, Willow, marking a pivotal advancement in the rapidly evolving field of quantum technology. This superconducting quantum chip demonstrates computational capabilities that far surpass even the most advanced classical supercomputers. Tasks that would take billions of years for classical systems to complete can now be solved in mere minutes. While the practical applications of quantum computing are still emerging, Willow's breakthroughs in error correction and scalability bring the technology closer to real-world implementation. However, these advancements also raise critical questions about their societal implications, particularly in areas such as cybersecurity, artificial intelligence (AI), and energy innovation. Willow represents Google's most advanced superconducting quantum chip to date, showcasing the extraordinary potential of quantum mechanics to solve problems that classical systems cannot address. By using the principle of superposition, Willow processes vast amounts of data simultaneously, allowing it to perform calculations at speeds exponentially faster than traditional computers. This unprecedented capability has the potential to transform various industries. For example: Willow's computational power offers a glimpse into a future where quantum technology could redefine how industries approach problem-solving, unlocking solutions to challenges previously deemed insurmountable. One of Willow's most significant achievements lies in its innovative approach to quantum error correction, a longstanding challenge in quantum computing. Quantum systems are inherently fragile, with qubits -- quantum bits -- highly susceptible to errors caused by environmental noise, instability, and interference. Willow introduces advanced techniques to address these vulnerabilities, even as the number of qubits increases. This progress is a critical step toward building fault-tolerant quantum systems capable of handling real-world applications. By improving error correction, Willow brings quantum computing closer to transitioning from experimental prototypes to practical, large-scale systems that can operate reliably in diverse environments. Explore further guides and articles from our vast library that you may find relevant to your interests in Quantum computing. The capabilities of Willow extend beyond theoretical computations, offering the potential to transform multiple industries. Some of the most promising areas of impact include: Willow's advancements highlight the potential for quantum computing to drive innovation across sectors, allowing solutions to some of the world's most pressing challenges. Despite its impressive capabilities, Willow's 105 qubits are not yet powerful enough to compromise modern cryptographic systems, such as those securing blockchain technologies and Bitcoin. However, as quantum computing continues to evolve, the risk to current encryption methods will inevitably grow. This emerging threat underscores the urgency of developing post-quantum cryptographic algorithms to safeguard sensitive data. Governments, businesses, and organizations must act proactively to ensure their security systems remain resilient in a quantum-enabled future. Preparing for this shift now will be essential to maintaining trust and protecting critical infrastructure as quantum technology advances. The advent of practical quantum computing has the potential to reshape industries, economies, and societal structures. From transforming energy production to allowing unprecedented advancements in AI, the possibilities are vast. However, this progress also demands proactive adaptation to the challenges it presents, particularly in areas such as cybersecurity, workforce development, and ethical considerations. As the timeline for commercial quantum computing shortens -- some experts estimate it could arrive within the next five years -- collaboration across sectors will be critical. Governments, academic institutions, and private enterprises must work together to harness quantum technology responsibly. By fostering innovation while addressing potential risks, stakeholders can ensure that the benefits of quantum computing are maximized for the greater good. Quantum computing operates on the principles of quantum mechanics, such as superposition and entanglement, to solve problems that are beyond the capabilities of classical systems. Google's development of Willow builds on its legacy of technological innovation, including new achievements in artificial intelligence, such as AlphaGo. While the path to widespread adoption of quantum computing remains complex, Willow's advancements signal a future where quantum technology could drive global innovation. By addressing challenges in scalability, error correction, and practical application, Willow represents a significant step toward realizing the full potential of quantum computing. This progress could enable solutions to some of humanity's most pressing challenges, from combating climate change to advancing medical research. Google's Willow chip represents a monumental leap forward in quantum computing, offering a glimpse into a future where this technology could transform industries and redefine the limits of computation. However, its development also highlights the need for careful consideration of its societal impact, particularly in areas such as security, ethics, and equitable access. As quantum computing evolves, staying informed and prepared will be essential. By understanding its potential and addressing its challenges, society can shape a future where quantum technology is used responsibly to benefit humanity as a whole.

Sundar Pichai, Elon Musk Dream of Building Quantum Clusters in Space

The unveiling of Google's quantum chip, Willow, not only marked a breakthrough in computation but also sparked a visionary exchange between Google CEO Sundar Pichai and SpaceX's Elon Musk. Pichai suggested, "We should do a quantum cluster in space with Starship one day," linking quantum advancements with Musk's interstellar ambitions. Musk responded confidently, "That will probably happen. Any self-respecting civilisation should at least reach Kardashev Type II," hinting at humanity's potential to harness galactic energy. Google's Willow chip shattered the limitations of classical computing, completing a computation in under five minutes that would take today's fastest supercomputer 10 septillion years. Using 105 qubits and exponential error correction, Willow solves challenges that have hindered quantum computing for decades. "This is a breakthrough," Pichai tweeted, celebrating the chip's historic achievement, breaking a 30-year challenge in the field. According to Julian Kelly, director of hardware at Google Quantum AI, "Willow achieves quantum coherence times of 100 microseconds -- five times longer than its predecessor Sycamore -- while delivering performance breakthroughs in error correction and computation scalability." By achieving quantum error rates below critical thresholds and outpacing the world's fastest supercomputers in certain benchmarks, Willow showcases the growing chasm between classical and quantum computing for complex tasks. The announcement reverberated across industries, drawing reactions from tech leaders and the public. Musk's reference to solar-powered deserts and humanity's low Kardashev scale ranking contextualised the enormity of Willow's leap. Meanwhile, experts like John Preskill called Willow's performance a defining moment: "The hardware has reached a stage where it can advance science in ways classical systems simply cannot." Cryptography experts flagged potential disruptions, as quantum systems may soon unravel classical encryption methods. On the practical side, Willow's capabilities promise revolutionary applications in AI, drug discovery, and energy optimisation -- fields constrained by classical systems. Microsoft also bets big on quantum. The company is making significant strides in quantum computing through a partnership with Atom Computing. The collaboration recently achieved a world record by entangling 24 logical qubits, with plans to launch a commercial quantum computer by 2025. "With 100 reliable qubits, we achieve scientific advantage," said Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, emphasising the transformative potential of fault-tolerant quantum systems. Microsoft's approach focuses on integrating quantum technology into its Azure platform, combining quantum and classical computing to address challenges in materials science, climate modeling, and drug discovery. Nadella highlighted the stakes, noting, "The foundation we're building now will determine the leaders of tomorrow." IBM, on the other hand, is positioning itself as a key player in the quantum race with its IBM Quantum System Two, described as "the building block of creating quantum supercomputers." These systems are already being deployed in countries like Japan, South Korea, and Germany. IBM's director of research emphasised their unique strength: "Quantum computers allow us to simulate nature in ways classical systems cannot," enabling breakthroughs in materials science, chemistry, and industrial processes. IBM CEO Arvind Krishna sees quantum as the next major frontier for the company, calling it "our big bet for the future." He highlighted the importance of integrating quantum with AI and cloud technologies, stating, "IBM will become a hybrid cloud, AI, and quantum company as the technology matures." Focusing on hybrid quantum-classical computing: A few days back, AWS partnered with NVIDIA to push the boundaries of hybrid quantum-classical computing with the integration of NVIDIA's CUDA-Q platform into Amazon Braket. This collaboration enables researchers to develop and test quantum-classical workflows using GPU-accelerated simulators within Braket's managed environment. Stefan Natu of AWS explained that the integration includes a pulse-level programming interface, initially mapped to QuEra's hardware, marking a significant step in Braket's evolution as a unified platform for quantum innovation. This partnership addresses the rising demand for classical compute resources essential for quantum tasks such as error correction and circuit simulation. Braket's GPU-based simulations have demonstrated up to 350x speed improvements over CPU-based alternatives, streamlining the testing and deployment of quantum algorithms. Looking forward, AWS and NVIDIA are targeting ultra-low latency co-processing and AI-enabled quantum simulations, paving the way for quantum-accelerated supercomputing. Building on the success of Willow, Google's roadmap aims to create a quantum computer with a thousand well-protected logical qubits -- equivalent to roughly a million physical qubits. This ambitious plan is part of a six-milestone strategy that Google Quantum AI has been pursuing since its breakthrough in 2019. "We are now approaching the third milestone, about halfway through our roadmap," said Hartmut Neven, the founder of Google Quantum AI. The next challenge lies in refining error correction further, an area critical for achieving fault-tolerant quantum systems. "There is always this competition between errors, classical systems, and the quantum machine," Neven explained. "If you're going to win, you have to fight off both the noise and the classical machine." Progress so far has been guided by Neven's Law, a principle describing the double exponential increase in computational power as qubit quality improves and error rates decline. Google is also focusing on moving from benchmarks like random circuit sampling (RCS), which demonstrates computational supremacy, to solving practical, commercially valuable problems. "The next step is to train this enormous compute power towards a task that people on Main Street would care for," said John Preskill, theoretical physicist and long-time quantum computing advocate. Neven remains optimistic about the timeline: "Early commercial applications could arrive in half a decade or a few years rather than multiple decades." With these developments, Google's vision for a quantum-first future is rapidly becoming reality, paving the way for transformative applications in science, technology, and beyond.

Google's WIllow chip is a big leap towards usable quantum computing but its claim of beating a classical computer by a 'septillion years' is meaningless

Quantum computers might seem like a work of science fiction but they really do exist. While they're still a long way from being used for the purposes for which they're best suited, Google's quantum computing research lab has published results on its latest chip that show the future isn't as distant as you'd think. The quantum chip in question is called Willow (via Ars Technica) and Google likes to use some rather creative copy to describe its capabilities: "Willow performed a standard benchmark computation in under five minutes that would take one of today's fastest supercomputers 10 septillion years -- a number that vastly exceeds the age of the Universe." That does sound mightily impressive but the benchmark in question is one that's essentially designed to showcase quantum computers in the best possible light. Even so, what Google has done with Willow is impressive, even if one ignores the hyperbole and all comes down to something called quantum error correction (QEC). This is a collection of techniques that are used to help overcome quantum computing's problems around errors and it's generally thought that QEC will be the tool that leverages quantum computing out of the lab and into everyday reality. The paper detailing Google's work is understandably very complex but the overall gist of it is that the researchers at Google Quantum AI discovered adding more qubits to Willow actually reduced its error rate, rather than increasing it. This was achieved by grouping more physical qubits (the quantum computing equivalent of a digital bit) into logical qubits, making it much easier to detect, and then correct, any errors. On face value, the numbers achieved don't seem particularly impressive -- 105 physical qubits in total, with an error rate of 0.143% -- but this is why Google used the 'septillion years' statement mentioned above, to try and put it into some kind of context. Something else that was an impressive achievement was the longevity of the logical qubits, with the quantum information being retained for up to an hour. Due to the way quantum computers work, it's impossible to achieve an error rate of zero and have an infinitely sustained qubit, but neither is required to achieve a practical, fully functional quantum computer. The errors just need to be low enough such that it's very unlikely to occur during a calculation cycle, as well as having no loss of qubits during that time. All that is some way still off being realised but Google's work has shown that it's certainly achievable. Now it will be a matter of continuing to scale what has already been discovered with Willow, increasing the qubit count and their longevity. From there, logic gates will be next and, ultimately, this will lead to a design for a genuine QEC processor that will ultimately be used to tackle problems that traditional supercomputers have grind to solve -- particularly AI, complex simulations, and data analysis. Just don't expect a quantum computer at home, to make you a cup of Earl Grey tea, any time soon.

Google's New Quantum AI Chip Makes a Big Processing Leap

Google has unveiled its latest quantum computing chip, called Willow, saying it delivers groundbreaking capabilities in error correction and computational power -- like completing a complex computing challenge in five minutes that would take one of today's fastest supercomputers 10 septillion years, or far longer than the universe has been around. This is a remarkable upgrade from Google's 2019 declaration that its quantum processor at the time, called Sycamore, could solve an equation in three minutes compared to 10,000 years on a supercomputer. (At the time, IBM pushed back on the claim, calling it overly optimistic.) The latest advancements, however, may signal major progress toward building a large-scale quantum computer capable of addressing complex scientific and societal challenges. Unlike traditional computers, quantum computers can process tons of data at the same time in a way that could be transformative for areas including scientific, medicine, energy and AI. However, quantum computing is prone to errors due to the instability of qubits, the fundamental units of quantum computation. Google said that Willow, which has 105 qubits, overcomes these issues by scaling up the number of qubits in a way that "exponentially" reduces errors. "The more qubits we use in Willow, the more we reduce errors, and the more quantum the system becomes," Hartmut Neven, founder and lead of Google Quantum AI, wrote in a Google blog post on Monday. "This cracks a key challenge in quantum error correction that the field has pursued for almost 30 years." Google also published the results of Willow's performance in the journal Nature, and you can see a summation of Willow's capabilities in the video clip above. "Looking to the future with Willow," Julian Kelly, director of hardware, Google Quantum AI, says in the video, "we continue to build large-scale useful error-corrected quantum computers that will push the boundaries of science and the exploration of nature. With future commercially useful applications in areas like pharmaceuticals, batteries and fusion power, we are excited to solve the otherwise unsolvable problems of tomorrow." Neven also noted in the blog post that the latest milestone is the result of over 10 years of work, noting it "moves us significantly along that path toward commercially relevant applications."

Google unveils 'astonishing' quantum computing chip called Willow

Google has unveiled a computing chip capable of solving problems in minutes that would take one of today's fastest supercomputers 10 septillion years to complete. As well as being extremely fast, the experimental quantum chip, called Willow, can reduce errors exponentially. That's important because currently, quantum computers exponentially create errors, according to Google. Hartmut Neven, the founder of Google Quantum AI, said: "The more qubits we use in Willow, the more we reduce errors, and the more quantum the system becomes." A "qubit" is a unit of information in quantum computing, like a "bit" in classic computing. A system is described as becoming "more" quantum the faster it solves problems. Google says its Willow quantum chip was created in Santa Barbara, in one of only a few facilities in the world built from the ground up for this purpose. In order to make a chip this advanced, the team behind Willow had to make sure every element was "well-functioning". "If any component lags or if two components don't function well together, it drags down system performance," said Mr Neven in a blog post. Read more from Sky News: 2024's most searched-for topics in the UK Frogs flown from Chile to London to save their lives Occasional sweet treat may be healthier than no sugar The team tested Willow against an existing supercomputer using a test called the "random circuit sampling (RCS) benchmark". If a quantum computer can't beat a classical computer in reaching that benchmark, "there is strong reason for scepticism that it can tackle more complex quantum tasks", according to Mr Neven. Willow's "astonishing" performance meant it performed a computation in under five minutes that would take one of today's fastest supercomputers 10 septillion years, or 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 years. That's thousands of billions of years - and longer than the age of the universe. At the moment, quantum computing is still experimental. In the future, though, it is expected to speed up many processes - from making medicines to nuclear fusion research. However, it's feared the technology could allow hackers to be more efficient, too. Google's next step, according to Mr Neven, is to find a "first 'useful, beyond-classical' computation" - a task that a classical computer couldn't do that is useful to real life.

Google unveils 'mindboggling' quantum computing chip

Chip takes minutes to complete tasks that would otherwise take 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 years It measures just 4cm squared but it possesses almost inconceivable speed. Google has built a computing chip that takes just five minutes to complete tasks that would take 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 years for some of the world's fastest conventional computers to complete. That's 10 septillion years, a number that far exceeds the age of our known universe and has the scientists behind the latest quantum computing breakthrough reaching for a distinctly non-technical term: "mindboggling". The new chip, called Willow and made in the California beach town of Santa Barbara, is about the dimensions of an After Eight mint, and could supercharge the creation of new drugs by greatly speeding up the experimental phase of development. Reports of its performance follow a flurry of results since 2021 that suggest we are only about five years away from quantum computing becoming powerful enough to start transforming humankind's capabilities to research and develop new materials from drugs to batteries, one independent UK expert said. Governments around the world are pouring tens of billions of dollars into research. Significantly, Willow is claimed to be far less prone to error than previous versions and could swell the potential of the already fast-developing field of artificial intelligence. Quantum computing - which harnesses the discovery that matter can exist in multiple states at once - is predicted to have the power to carry out far bigger calculations than previously possible and so hasten the creation of nuclear fusion reactors and accelerate the impact of artificial intelligence, notably in medical science. For example, it could allow MRI scans to be read in atom-level detail, unlocking new caches of data about human bodies and disease for AI to process, Google said. But there are also fears that without guardrails, the technology has the power to crack even the most sophisticated encryption, undermining computer security. Google Quantum AI is one of numerous groups wrestling with how to harness the computing power of quantum mechanics including Microsoft, Harvard University and Quantinuum, a firm with UK links. A key problem is reducing the fragility of quantum chips as even microscopic material defects, cosmic rays and ionising radiation tend to knock them off course. "Quantum processors are peeling away at a double exponential rate and will continue to vastly outperform classical computers as we scale up," said Hartmut Neven, the founder of the firm, who said that the latest test results, published on Monday in Nature magazine, "cracks a key challenge in quantum error correction that the field has pursued for almost 30 years". He said the far greater speed of the new chip than classical computers "lends credence to the notion that quantum computation occurs in many parallel universes, in line with the idea that we live in a multiverse". Simply put, if a quantum computer can be in many different states at once, it can get more done at the same time. Dr Peter Leek, research fellow at the University of Oxford's Quantum Institute and founder of Oxford Quantum Circuits, said: "It's definitely thought-provoking to put it that way. What it really does is show that quantum computing technology is rapidly moving forward. It really is working." He described the Google results as a "shining example" of improvements in error correction, but he cautioned that the very fast processing results related to calculations that were "not of much real-world use". "I'm very optimistic," he said. "I think we're going to see a real acceleration over the next five years and then we'll be able to say, look, this machine has calculated an interesting thing that I can explain to someone, and how it could be used in the real world." Asked about the risks of high-powered quantum computers wrecking current systems of encryption, Charina Chou, the director and chief operating officer of Google Quantum AI, said: "Security experts have been working on this, and they've had ample time over the last many years to really figure out what the right standards should be, what post-quantum encryption should look like." She added: "We're working with a number of both large companies, as well as academics and startups in this space, right of physics, of chemistry, material science that seems very, very ripe for collaboration."

This Is What You Need to Know About the Google Willow Quantum Chipset

Logical qubits pave way for solving real-world computational challenges A recent study published in Nature has detailed a major achievement by Google's Quantum AI team. Their latest quantum processor, named "Willow," solved a computational problem in five minutes that would have taken the world's most advanced supercomputer an estimated 10 septillion years. This achievement marks significant progress in overcoming one of the greatest challenges in quantum computing -- reducing errors as the machines scale. Quantum computers are known for their high error rates, where approximately one in 1,000 qubits fail during calculations. In comparison, traditional computers experience failures in only one out of a billion billion bits. This discrepancy has made error-correction methods critical for advancing the technology. The Willow processor, which contains 105 physical qubits, employs error-correcting technologies that reduce inaccuracies as more qubits are added, an achievement first theorised by computer scientist Peter Shor in 1995. Google Quantum AI's Julian Kelly, director of quantum hardware, told Live Science that the team's focus has been on achieving a state where fewer errors are introduced than are corrected. The Willow processor's design integrates physical qubits into "logical qubits," enabling calculations to proceed even if individual qubits fail. Through advancements in machine learning, device fabrication, and calibration techniques, the team reported coherence times of up to 100 microseconds -- five times better than their previous Sycamore processor, the researchers stated in the study. The team's immediate goal is to construct a logical qubit with an error rate of one in a million, requiring 1,457 physical qubits. Once achieved, their efforts will shift towards connecting multiple logical qubits to solve real-world problems. While the Willow processor has demonstrated exponential error reduction, scientists aim to move beyond benchmarks and focus on practical computations that extend the capabilities of quantum machines. This progress, as highlighted in the study and expert discussions, indicates a path forward for quantum computing to outperform classical systems in diverse applications.

Google's Willow quantum chip breakthrough is hidden behind a questionable benchmark

Forget about RCS performance, the error rate is the important bit here. Google debuted Willow, its latest quantum chip, on Wednesday, and if you've spent any time online since, you've undoubtedly run into some breathless reporting about it. Willow "crushes classical computers on a cosmic timescale," proclaims one headline; Google "unveils 'mind-boggling' quantum computer chip," reads another. It's all anchored by a claim that Willow can complete a computation that would theoretically take a classical computer significantly more time than the 14 billion years the universe has existed. But, as you can probably guess, what the chip represents is not so simple. First, with Willow, Google makes no claim of quantum supremacy, something the company did when it publicly debuted its previous generation quantum computer, Sycamore, back in 2019. You may recall that, at the time, Google publicized how it took Sycamore just 200 seconds to perform a calculation that would have theoretically taken the world's then-fastest supercomputer 10,000 years to complete. That feat, the company said, demonstrated that it had created a quantum computer that could solve problems the best classical computers could not even attempt. In other words, Google had achieved quantum supremacy. However, that claim quickly ended in controversy, with one researcher calling the company's announcement "indefensible" and "just plain wrong," and Google has since avoided talking about quantum supremacy. Instead, it just says it has achieved "beyond classical computation." Part of the issue was that Sycamore was not a general-purpose quantum computer; instead, it was designed to surpass classical computers in a single task known as random circuit sampling or RCS. The thing about RCS is that, in Google's own words, it has "no known real-world applications." Yet, here again, the company is touting RCS performance. Google says Willow can complete its latest RCS benchmark in under five minutes. By contrast, the company estimates it would take Frontier, currently the world's second most powerful supercomputer, 10 septillion years to complete the same task. That number, Google says, "lends credence to the notion that quantum computation occurs in many parallel universes, in line with the idea that we live in a multiverse." More practically, Google tries to make the case that RCS performance should be the metric by which all quantum computers are judged. According to Hartmut Neven, the founder of Google Quantum AI, "it's an entry point. If you can't win on random circuit sampling, you can't win on any other algorithm either." He adds RCS is "now widely used as a standard in the field." However, other companies, including IBM and Honeywell, instead use a metric called quantum volume to tout their breakthroughs. They claim it points to a more holistic understanding of a machine's capabilities by factoring in how its qubits interact with one another. Unfortunately, you won't find any mention of quantum volume in the spec sheet Google shared for Willow, making comparisons difficult. To that point, the far more impressive claim Google is making today is that Willow is "below the threshold." To date, the problem that has plagued every attempt to build a useful quantum computer is that the quantum bits they're based on are difficult to control. They only hold their quantum state for fractions of a second, and the more qubits are added to a system, the more likely it is to produce errors. However, with Willow, Google says it has found a way to reduce errors as it adds more qubits to the system. According to the company, Willow is the first time this has been done. "As the first system below threshold, this is the most convincing prototype for a scalable logical qubit built to date. It's a strong sign that useful, very large quantum computers can indeed be built," says Neven. "Willow brings us closer to running practical, commercially-relevant algorithms that can't be replicated on conventional computers." That's the real breakthrough here, and one that points to a future where quantum computers could solve problems that have tangible effects on people's lives. That future, however, isn't here just yet, and even Google admits it has more work to do before it gets there.

Google's Quantum AI Breakthrough: Meet the Willow Chip

Google Quantum AI has unveiled the Willow superconducting quantum computing chip, marking a significant advancement in quantum technology. This innovative chip offers extended quantum coherence times, improved error correction, and computational power far beyond that of classical supercomputers. Willow represents a crucial milestone on the path toward scalable, error-corrected quantum systems with transformative potential across industries like pharmaceuticals and energy. One of Willow's key achievements is its ability to exponentially reduce errors as quantum processors scale up with more qubits, addressing a challenge in quantum error correction that has persisted for nearly three decades. Demonstrating its immense computational capabilities, Willow completed a standard benchmark computation in under five minutes -- a task that would take the most powerful supercomputers 10 septillion years (10^25 years), a figure that dwarfs the age of the universe. Willow builds upon the foundation laid by its predecessors, including Foxtail (2017), Bristlecone (2018), and Sycamore (2019), to set a new benchmark in quantum performance. One of its most notable achievements is achieving quantum coherence times of up to 100 microseconds, a fivefold improvement over Sycamore's 20 microseconds. This enhancement enables more complex and reliable quantum computations, a critical step toward the realization of error-corrected quantum systems. These systems rely on logical qubits, which combine multiple physical qubits to ensure stability and functionality beyond the limitations of individual components. The extended coherence times and improved stability of Willow are essential for advancing quantum error correction, a cornerstone of scalable quantum computing. By addressing the inherent fragility of quantum states, Willow paves the way for practical applications that were previously unattainable. Willow incorporates a series of technological breakthroughs that enhance its performance, reliability, and scalability: These advancements bring quantum computing closer to practical, real-world applications, bridging the gap between experimental research and fantastic technology. By addressing key challenges such as error correction and computational efficiency, Willow represents a significant step toward unlocking the full potential of quantum systems. The Willow chip features innovative hardware and software innovations that enhance its functionality and reliability: The integration of these hardware and software advancements ensures that Willow operates at peak efficiency, setting the stage for the development of more robust and scalable quantum computing platforms. By addressing both physical and operational challenges, Willow exemplifies the synergy between engineering and quantum science. The capabilities demonstrated by Willow have profound implications across a wide range of industries. Its advancements in quantum computing open the door to solving complex problems that were previously insurmountable: Looking ahead, Google Quantum AI is committed to the development of large-scale, error-corrected quantum computers capable of addressing real-world challenges. These systems hold the potential to transform industries by tackling problems such as supply chain optimization, advancing artificial intelligence, and combating climate change. The progress achieved with Willow brings this vision closer to reality, offering a glimpse into a future where quantum computing reshapes science, industry, and society.

Google Makes New Quantum Computing Breakthrough

In 2019, a team of Google researchers said they had built a machine capable of performing tasks that were not possible with traditional supercomputers. They described this machine, called a quantum computer, as a turning point in the evolution of information technology. Some scientists disputed the claim. In the years since, as traditional supercomputers grew more powerful, they matched the feats of Google's quantum computer. On Monday, Google unveiled a new quantum computer that may end this back-and-forth race with traditional machines and that points to a future in which quantum computers could drive advances in areas like drug discovery and artificial intelligence. Google said its quantum computer, based on a computer chip called Willow, needed less than five minutes to perform a mathematical calculation that one of the world's most powerful supercomputers could not complete in 10 septillion years, a length of time that exceeds the age of the known universe. Quantum computing -- the result of decades of research into a type of physics called quantum mechanics -- is still an experimental technology. But Google's achievement shows that scientists are steadily improving techniques that could allow quantum computing to live up to the enormous expectations that have surrounded this big idea for decades. "When quantum computing was originally envisioned, many people -- including many leaders in the field -- felt that it would never be a practical thing," said Mikhail Lukin, a professor of physics at Harvard and a co-founder of the quantum computing start-up QuEra. "What has happened over the last year shows that it is no longer science fiction." Many other tech giants, including Microsoft, Intel and IBM, are building similar technology as the United States jockeys with China for supremacy in this increasingly important field. As the United States has pushed forward, primarily through corporate giants and start-up companies, the Chinese government has said it is pumping more than $15.2 billion into quantum research. The mathematical calculation performed by Google's machine was a test designed solely to gauge the progress of quantum computing -- not a task that could be useful in other fields, like medicine. Though researchers believe that quantum computers will one day make today's classical machines look archaic, the technology still makes too many mistakes to be truly useful. Google's quantum computer also uses a form of error correction -- a way of reducing mistakes -- that could allow this kind of machine to reach its potential. In a research paper published on Monday in the science journal Nature, Google said its machine had surpassed the "error correction threshold," a milestone that scientists have been working toward for decades. That means quantum computers are on a path to a moment, still in well into the future, when they can overcome their mistakes and perform calculations that could accelerate the progress of drug discovery. They could also break the encryption that protects computers vital to national security. "What we really want these machines to do is run applications that people really care about," said John Preskill, a theoretical physicist at the California Institute of Technology who specializes in quantum computing. "Though it still might be decades away, we will eventually see the impact of quantum computing on our everyday lives." A traditional computer like a laptop or a smartphone stores numbers in silicon chips and manipulates those numbers, adding them, multiplying them and so on. It performs these calculations by processing "bits" of information. Each bit holds either a 1 or a 0. But a quantum computer defies common sense. It relies on the mind-bending ways that some objects behave at the subatomic level or when exposed to extreme cold, like the exotic metal that Google chills to nearly 460 degrees below zero inside its quantum computer. Quantum bits, or "qubits," behave very differently from normal bits. A single object can behave like two separate objects at the same time when it is either extremely small or extremely cold. By harnessing that behavior, scientists can build a qubit that holds a combination of 1 and 0. This means that two qubits can hold four values at once. And as the number of qubits grows, a quantum computer becomes exponentially more powerful. Scientists first proposed this kind of machine in the 1980s. But qubits are fragile, which means that stringing even a few of them together requires years of work. Labs in academia, industry and government have used a wide variety of techniques to build these machines, including systems based on particles of light or tiny charged particles trapped in electromagnetic fields. Like IBM and Intel, Google builds "superconducting qubits," where certain metals are cooled to extremely low temperatures. With its latest superconducting computer, Google has claimed "quantum supremacy," meaning it has built a machine capable of tasks that are beyond what any traditional computer can do. But these tasks are esoteric. They involve generating random numbers that can't necessarily be applied to practical applications, like drug discovery. Google and its rivals are still working toward what scientists call "quantum advantage," when a quantum computer can accelerate the progress of other fields like chemistry and artificial intelligence or perform tasks that businesses or consumers find useful. The problem is that quantum computers still make too many errors. But scientists have spent nearly three decades developing techniques -- which are mind-bending in their own right -- for getting around this problem. Now, Google has shown that as it increases the number of qubits, it can exponentially reduce the number of errors through complex analysis. Experts believe it is only a matter of time before a quantum computer reaches its vast potential. "People no longer doubt it will be done," Dr. Lukin said. "The question now is: When?"

Is it getting more difficult for humans? Google says its new quantum chip is more powerful than the world's fastest super computer; here's what Willow can do

Google's latest quantum chip, Willow, is making headlines for achieving computational feats previously deemed impossible.Google's latest quantum chip, Willow, has achieved groundbreaking milestones in the field of quantum computing, potentially redefining the future of computation. In a stunning demonstration, Willow solved a problem in under five minutes that would take Frontier, the world's fastest supercomputer, an astonishing 10 septillion years to complete. This incredible feat marks a major leap forward in the pursuit of scalable, error-resistant quantum computers. However, Willow demonstrated an ability to reduce errors exponentially as it scaled, a phenomenon termed "below threshold" in the industry. According to Hartmut Neven, founder of Google Quantum AI, the chip managed to halve error rates with every addition of encoded qubits, marking a historic achievement in quantum error correction. Willow's performance was evaluated using the Random Circuit Sampling (RCS) benchmark, considered one of the toughest challenges for quantum computers. The results confirmed that Willow is capable of computations far beyond the reach of classical computers. For instance, the chip's ability to solve a mathematical puzzle in mere minutes -- an endeavor that would take classical computers longer than the universe's age -- highlights its immense potential for advancing scientific discovery. Also Read : Jay-Z lawsuit beginning to hurt wife Beyonce? Singer's 2025 tour and Christmas NFL appearance now in serious doubt Google envisions quantum computing technology like Willow revolutionizing multiple industries. From developing next-generation drugs to designing energy-efficient batteries, the applications are vast. In addition to these innovations, Google aims to make quantum computing accessible by offering open-source tools and a Coursera course to enable researchers and engineers to create future-solving algorithms. Tech leaders, including Elon Musk, have shown enthusiasm for Willow's potential, with discussions about integrating quantum technology into ambitious projects like space-based quantum clusters. With Willow, Google has not only set a benchmark for quantum computing but also inspired hope for a future where large-scale, error-resistant quantum machines address humanity's biggest challenges. As Neven emphasized, Willow serves as a convincing prototype for scalable quantum systems, proving that a useful, large-scale quantum computer is no longer a distant dream. Also Read : Is Nissan heading for bankruptcy; will Honda buy the iconic Japanese auto maker? Here's what reports are saying What is Willow? Willow is Google's new quantum chip that can perform computations much faster than the world's fastest supercomputers. What makes Willow special? Willow can reduce errors as it uses more qubits, solving a major challenge in quantum computing that existed for nearly 30 years.

Google Says it Has Cracked a Quantum Computing Challenge with New Chip

The math problem solved by the chip does not have commercial applications Google on Monday said that it has overcome a key challenge in quantum computing with a new generation of chip, solving a computing problem in five minutes that would take a classical computer more time than the history of the universe. Like other tech giants such as Microsoft and International Business Machines, Alphabet's Google is chasing quantum computing because it promises computing speeds far faster than today's fastest systems. While the math problem solved by the company's Santa Barbara, California quantum lab does not have commercial applications, Google hopes quantum computers will one day solve problems in medicine, battery chemistry and Artificial Intelligence (AI) that are out of reach for today's computers. The results released Monday came from a new chip called Willow that has 105 "qubits," which are the building blocks of quantum computers. Qubits are fast but error-prone, because they can be jostled by something as small as a subatomic particle from events in outer space. As more qubits are packed onto a chip, those errors can add up to make the chip no better than a conventional computer chip. So since the 1990s, scientists have been working on quantum error-correction. In a paper published in the journal Nature on Monday, Google said that it has found a way to string together the Willow chip's qubits so that error rates go down as the number of qubits goes up. The company also says it can correct errors in real time, a key step toward making its quantum machines practical. "We are past the break even point," Hartmut Neven, who leads the Google Quantum AI unit, said in an interview. In 2019, IBM challenged Google's claim that Google's quantum chip solved a problem that would take a classical computer 10,000 years, saying the problem could be solved in two-and-a-half days using different technical assumptions about a classical system. In a blog post Monday, Google said it took some of those concerns into account in its newest estimates. Even under the most idealistic conditions, Google said a classical computer would still take a billion years to get the same results as its newest chip. Some of Google's rivals are producing chips with a larger number of qubits than Google, but Google is focused on making the most reliable qubits it can, Anthony Megrant, chief architect for Google Quantum AI, said in an interview. Google fabricated its previous chips in a shared facility at the University of California, Santa Barbara, but built its own dedicated fabrication facility to produce its Willow chips. Megrant said that new facility will speed up how fast Google can make future chips, which are chilled in huge refrigerators called cryostats to run experiments. "If we have a good idea, we want somebody on the team to be able to ... get that into the clean room and into one of these cryostats as fast as possible, so we can get lots of cycles of learning," Megrant said. © Thomson Reuters 2024

Google says it has cracked a quantum computing challenge with new chip

SANTA BARBARA, California (Reuters) - Google on Monday said that it has overcome a key challenge in quantum computing with a new generation of chip, solving a computing problem in five minutes that would take a classical computer more time than the history of the universe. Like other tech giants such as Microsoft and International Business Machines, Alphabet's Google is chasing quantum computing because it promises computing speeds far faster than today's fastest systems. While the math problem solved by the company's Santa Barbara, California quantum lab does not have commercial applications, Google hopes quantum computers will one day solve problems in medicine, battery chemistry and artificial intelligence that are out of reach for today's computers. The results released Monday came from a new chip called Willow that has 105 "qubits," which are the building blocks of quantum computers. Qubits are fast but error-prone, because they can be jostled by something as small as a subatomic particle from events in outer space. As more qubits are packed onto a chip, those errors can add up to make the chip no better than a conventional computer chip. So since the 1990s, scientists have been working on quantum error-correction. In a paper published in the journal Nature on Monday, Google said that it has found a way to string together the Willow chip's qubits so that error rates go down as the number of qubits goes up. The company also says it can correct errors in real time, a key step toward making its quantum machines practical. "We are past the break even point," Hartmut Neven, who leads the Google Quantum AI unit, said in an interview. In 2019, IBM challenged Google's claim that Google's quantum chip solved a problem that would take a classical computer 10,000 years, saying the problem could be solved in two-and-a-half days using different technical assumptions about a classical system. In a blog post Monday, Google said it took some of those concerns into account in its newest estimates. Even under the most idealistic conditions, Google said a classical computer would still take a billion years to get the same results as its newest chip. Some of Google's rivals are producing chips with a larger number of qubits than Google, but Google is focused on making the most reliable qubits it can, Anthony Megrant, chief architect for Google Quantum AI, said in an interview. Google fabricated its previous chips in a shared facility at the University of California, Santa Barbara, but built its own dedicated fabrication facility to produce its Willow chips. Megrant said that new facility will speed up how fast Google can make future chips, which are chilled in huge refrigerators called cryostats to run experiments. "If we have a good idea, we want somebody on the team to be able to ... get that into the clean room and into one of these cryostats as fast as possible, so we can get lots of cycles of learning," Megrant said. (Reporting by Stephen Nellis in Santa Barbara, California; editing by Diane Craft)

Google Unveils New Quantum Computer With Mind-Boggling Speed

(Bloomberg) -- Alphabet Inc.'s quantum computer needs just five minutes to solve a problem that would take supercomputers around 10 septillion years. Google's next task: coming up with an actual use for all that theoretical power. Google said its computer using the new Willow quantum chip beat the Frontier supercomputer in running a benchmark algorithm, doing in minutes what would take Frontier 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 years -- far longer than the age of the universe. That's exponentially faster than Google's stated performance five years ago, when it said it could solve a 10,000-year task in minutes. The algorithm, designed to test the quantum computer's capabilities, has no known useful applications, but that's beside the point, according to Hartmut Neven, founder of Google Quantum AI. "If you cannot win at least on a problem, you won't win on a useful problem either," Neven said in an interview. Google targets delivering a real-world use case next year that would be impossible for a classical computer to solve, he said. "That is now getting within reach." Governments, as well as some of the world's biggest tech companies and venture capitalists, have poured billions of dollars into quantum computers, lured by the promise of commercial and military supremacy arising from computing speeds millions of times greater than that of classical computers. But because quantum computers harness the behavior of subatomic particles, they need to operate in environments that prevent the particles from interacting with their surroundings, with most experiments assuming temperatures near absolute zero. Such limitations have made it difficult to find practical and real-world applications for the technology, as high error rates made it difficult to conduct quantum computing at scale. The Willow chip lowers error rates, according to a paper published in the scientific journal Nature on Monday. That makes it possible to build a bigger quantum computer, and Google's now in a position to begin weighing costs, Neven said. Various methodologies are vying to win the quantum computing arena. Google's technology is called superconducting qubits, also used by rivals International Business Machines Corp. and Amazon.com Inc., and the Willow chips are made with tools similar to those used to make conventional microchips. But Google also recently invested in QuEra Computing Inc which uses what's known as neutral atom qubits. A qubit is the basic unit of information in quantum computing. "When we make that decision to pull the trigger to scale up, we want to be absolutely certain we scale up the most promising technology. Our money is on that this would be superconducting qubits," said Neven. "But maybe QuEra teaches us that neutral atoms have their advantages. We'll see."

Google says its new quantum chip is septillions of years faster than the world's most powerful supercomputer

Google's latest quantum chip, Willow, has demonstrated "two major achievements" in quantum computing, including "exponentially" reducing the rate of errors when adding more qubits -- a challenge that has existed for almost 30 years, Hartmut Neven, founder and lead of Google Quantum AI, said in a statement. Qubits are the units of computation in quantum computers, and are typically electrons, photons, or another subatomic particle. The more qubits that are used, the more errors typically occur, Neven said. That makes the system more classical than quantum. Unlike classical computers, which use bits that represent 0s or 1s, qubits can exist in a state of superposition, or be 0 and 1 at the same time. This enables quantum computers to carry out research and experiments that classical computers cannot. "Errors are one of the greatest challenges in quantum computing," Neven said, because they "have a tendency to rapidly exchange information with their environment, making it difficult to protect the information needed to complete a computation." According to results published in Nature on Monday, Google Quantum AI found that the more qubits it used in Willow, the more it reduced errors. Google Quantum AI tested ever-larger grids of encoded qubits, and found that it was able to cut the error rate in half each time. "This historic accomplishment is known in the field as 'below threshold' -- being able to drive errors down while scaling up the number of qubits," Neven said. In addition to demonstrating "below threshold," Willow was able to perform a computation in under five minutes that would take Frontier, currently considered the world's fastest supercomputer, 10 septillion years to solve. The assessment of Willow's performance compared to Frontier "was based on conservative assumptions," Neven said. The Google Quantum AI team used the industry standard random circuit sampling (RCS) benchmark it pioneered to measure the chip's performance, and said it is "the classically hardest benchmark that can be done on a quantum computer today." Willow's accomplishments demonstrate that it's possible to build a "useful, large-scale quantum computer," Neven said. Quantum computers are already being used for some novel drug development and designing efficient batteries for electric cars.

Google says it has cracked quantum computing challenge with new chip

A person shows Google Quantum AI's "Willow" chip, in this undated handout photo, Dec. 6. Reuters-Yonhap Google on Monday said that it has overcome a key challenge in quantum computing with a new generation of chip, solving a computing problem in five minutes that would take a classical computer more time than the history of the universe. Like other tech giants such as Microsoft and International Business Machines, Alphabet's Google is chasing quantum computing because it promises computing speeds far faster than today's fastest systems. While the math problem solved by the company's Santa Barbara, California quantum lab does not have commercial applications, Google hopes quantum computers will one day solve problems in medicine, battery chemistry and artificial intelligence that are out of reach for today's computers. The results released Monday came from a new chip called Willow that has 105 "qubits," which are the building blocks of quantum computers. Qubits are fast but error-prone, because they can be jostled by something as small as a subatomic particle from events in outer space. As more qubits are packed onto a chip, those errors can add up to make the chip no better than a conventional computer chip. So since the 1990s, scientists have been working on quantum error-correction. In a paper published in the journal Nature on Monday, Google said that it has found a way to string together the Willow chip's qubits so that error rates go down as the number of qubits goes up. The company also says it can correct errors in real time, a key step toward making its quantum machines practical. "We are past the break even point," Hartmut Neven, who leads the Google Quantum AI unit, said in an interview. In 2019, IBM challenged Google's claim that Google's quantum chip solved a problem that would take a classical computer 10,000 years, saying the problem could be solved in two-and-a-half days using different technical assumptions about a classical system. In a blog post Monday, Google said it took some of those concerns into account in its newest estimates. Even under the most idealistic conditions, Google said a classical computer would still take a billion years to get the same results as its newest chip. Some of Google's rivals are producing chips with a larger number of qubits than Google, but Google is focused on making the most reliable qubits it can, Anthony Megrant, chief architect for Google Quantum AI, said in an interview. Google fabricated its previous chips in a shared facility at the University of California, Santa Barbara, but built its own dedicated fabrication facility to produce its Willow chips. Megrant said that new facility will speed up how fast Google can make future chips, which are chilled in huge refrigerators called cryostats to run experiments. "If we have a good idea, we want somebody on the team to be able to ... get that into the clean room and into one of these cryostats as fast as possible, so we can get lots of cycles of learning," Megrant said. (Reuters)

Finding solace in quantum computing

Google's new quantum chip, Willow, reduces errors as complexity increases, potentially revolutionizing computing. While it doesn't immediately impact generative AI's profitability struggles, Willow's improved architecture is a significant step towards commercially viable quantum computing. However, further development is needed before quantum computing significantly influences AI's trajectory.Google's announcement of Willow, a quantum chip that reduces errors as complexity rises, holds the promise of a real breakthrough in computing. Quantum computing assigns probabilities to the binary logic of classical computing, which allows for magnified processing capacity. However, quantum bits hold their state for only fractions of a second and are prone to error as more of these are added to a chip. Google's claim that it has found a way to reduce errors as it adds more qubits clears a hurdle in the commercial application of quantum computing. Other claims about how fast Willow is relative to classical computing may be open to interpretation, but that does not diminish Google's achievement in quantum chip architecture. There is little immediate effect, though, of the breakthrough on the development of generative AI, for which Google admits the climb may have become steeper. LLMs on which generative AI trains are yet to generate profit for their creators. Some of this is due to computing costs, which a chip like Willow may eventually address. As AI reaches commercial viability, it will benefit from the possible practical applications of quantum computing. Yet, Google is claiming the supremacy of its chip on one metric by which they are assessed. It may have to work on other parameters that provide a more holistic assessment of a quantum chip's performance. The field is still open for AI, and that is reflected in how investors are valuing its champions. Alphabet, Google's holding company, rose on news of Willow but is trailing Microsoft and Amazon in valuation gains this year. Tech companies will continue to chase their hardware fix in their AI race, but quantum computing is unlikely to deliver before algorithms profitably take over decision-making from humans on a wider scale. There is heavy lifting ahead in making AI commercially viable, which could affect the pace of quantum computing development.

Go inside the Google Quantum AI lab to learn about how quantum computing works

Today, Google's Quantum AI team unveiled Willow, a state-of-the-art quantum computing chip that has demonstrated the ability to not only exponentially correct errors, but also process certain computations faster than supercomputers could within known timescales in physics. This is a significant milestone in the Quantum AI team's journey to create a reliable quantum computer that can expand human knowledge for the benefit of all people. Quantum is a new approach to computing, where people are building machines that use quantum mechanics -- the fundamental language of the universe -- to break through the limits of classical computing. Step inside the Google Quantum AI lab to learn more about how quantum computing works and understand six key quantum concepts. Quantum computing is an entirely new style of computing. Most people are familiar with classical computing: the binary digits (or "bits") that can be either 1's or 0's, which power everything from graphing calculators to massive data centers, and underlie almost all of the digital innovation from the past half-century. Quantum computing is different. Rather than using classical bits, quantum computing uses quantum bits, or "qubits." Qubits behave according to the laws of quantum physics. Instead of being confined to the "either/or" of binary 1's and 0's, they can exist as a blend of both. Qubits can store information in superposition (multiple states at the same time) of 0 and 1. They can also be entangled with each other to make even more complex combos -- e.g., two qubits can be in a blend of 00, 01, 10 and 11. When you entangle lots of qubits together, you open up a vast number of states they can be in, which gives you lots of computational power. Those two special properties provide quantum computers with the superpower to solve some of the most difficult problems much, much faster than regular, classical computers can. Unlike classical computing chips -- which are produced by a huge and well-established industry -- quantum is such a new style of computing that Google makes our own qubits in-house with superconducting integrated circuits. By patterning superconducting metals in a new way, we form circuits with capacitance (the ability to store energy in electrical fields) and inductance (the ability to store energy in magnetic fields), along with special nonlinear elements called Josephson junctions. By carefully choosing materials and dialing in the fabrication processes, we can build chips with high-quality qubits that can be controlled and integrated into large, complex devices. Quantum computers can be prima donnas. They have the ability to solve problems that would be impossible on classical computers, but they're also highly susceptible to errors from "noise," or disturbances like radio waves, electromagnetic fields and heat (even cosmic rays!). So -- much like building a sound studio for recording artists -- to protect the integrity of quantum computing processes, the Quantum AI team builds special packaging to reduce the noise. They place qubits in this special packaging to connect them to the external world while shielding them from external disturbances as much as possible. Achieving this requires extensive and highly complex mechanical and electromagnetic engineering work, as well as a focus on details such as choosing the right materials or deciding the specific locations to put holes for circuitry. Controlling a quantum computer requires sending signals through environments with temperatures of extreme variations. We control qubits with microwave signals, which are delivered through special wires from room temperature all the way to extremely low temperatures. Those wires are chosen to ensure we can deliver signals in the most efficient and accurate way possible. Adding elements such as filtering in the middle of those wires further protects our qubits from being affected by external noise. Operating superconducting qubits requires us to keep them at extremely low temperatures that are colder than outer space. A special piece of equipment called a dilution fridge is needed to reach these ultra-cold and dark conditions. By keeping our qubits inside the dilution fridge, the superconducting metals can enter their zero-resistance state -- a frigid state where electricity can flow without energy loss -- and we can reduce unwanted things like thermal noise. In this way, our superconducting qubits can maintain their quantum properties and perform complex calculations for quantum computing. Willow is the latest step in our Quantum AI team's work to unlock the full potential of quantum computing. Now that you've gotten a sense of our lab work, check out our quantum computing roadmap to see how we're planning to bring quantum out of the lab and into useful applications.

Starship to crypto: Google chip 'Willow' beats supercomputers hollow

Google has launched a breakthrough in quantum computing with the launch of 'Willow'. The chip can solve a computational problem in just less than five minutes. The same task would take a classic supercomputer 10 septillion years, more than the history of the universe. The quantum leap will transform areas like healthcare, fusion energy and battery design. Google believes Willow will help it achieve goals in AI, medicine, energy systems and fusion energy research. It will unveil more use cases for the chip by next year.

What is 'Willow' Google's New Quantum Computing Chip?

Willow can solve problems in five minutes that would take the world's fastest supercomputers 10 years to solve Google has unveiled its long-awaited chip, Willow, a breakthrough in quantum computing. This new quantum computing chip promises to solve untouchable problems for classical supercomputers. Willow is set to transform industries like drug discovery, nuclear fusion, battery technology, etc. Let's explore the latest features of Google's quantum computing chip in detail to understand how it will advance the AI and technology of the future.

Google passes milestone on road to an error-free quantum computer

Quantum bits' delicate states preserved by spreading them out In a long-awaited advance, researchers at Google have shown they can suppress errors in the finicky quantum bits critical to the promise of quantum computing. By spreading one "logical" qubit of information across multiple redundant physical qubits, they enabled it to survive longer than the fragile quantum state of any of the physical qubits, according to a report today in . "This result is what convinces me that we can actually build a big quantum computer that will work," says Kevin Satzinger, a physicist with Google Quantum AI. Scott Aaronson, a theoretical computer scientist at the University of Texas at Austin, says the work "very clearly represents an exciting milestone for the field." But he notes that researchers using other types of qubits are also closing in on practical error correction. Unlike conventional bits, which can be set only to 0 or 1, a qubit can also be put in a weird 0-and-1 state. That property could enable a full-fledged quantum computer to solve certain problems that would overwhelm the best conventional supercomputer. For example, it could factor huge numbers and crack the encryption algorithms that until recently set the standards for protecting information on the internet. Today's quantum computers can't do anything like that, however, because their qubits can't maintain their delicate two-way states long enough. The product of decades of innovation in microchip fabrication, Google's qubits are tiny superconducting circuits that slosh with current. A lower energy state represents 0 and a higher state represents 1. Microwaves can ease the circuit into one state or the other -- or both at once. But the quantum state of a superconducting qubit persists for just a fraction of a millisecond before environmental noise scrambles it, causing, for example, 0 and 1 to flip. Ordinary computers can correct for errors by simply making copies of a bit. The computer takes the reading of the majority of the bits as the true state of the "logical" bit. By comparing pairs of bits, it can even deduce which ones flipped. But this tack won't work for qubits. In quantum mechanics, a "no-cloning" theorem forbids the copying of one qubit's state on to another. And even if cloning were possible, the act of measuring a qubit's precarious two-way state generally squashes it to be either 0 or 1. To correct a qubit's state without copying or measuring it, researchers first need to spread it to other qubits using a subtle quantum link called entanglement. To make a single logical qubit, for example, a qubit in the 0-and-1 state can be entangled with two others so that all three are 0 and, simultaneously, all three are 1. Researchers also entangle an "ancillary" qubit with each pair of "data" qubits, to keep tabs on them. By measuring just the ancillas, researchers can detect whether any of data qubits flip without touching them. In principle they can then flip a disturbed data qubit back. In reality, the simplest error-correcting scheme requires a square grid of data qubits and interleaved ancillas. If the physical qubits are too flaky, the errors just proliferate. But if the physical qubits and their interactions are sufficiently clean, then expanding the array of qubits makes the state of the encoded "logical" qubit more robust. And at some point it passes the threshold at which it lasts longer than the state of the physical qubits, explains Michael Newman, a physicist at Google. "Threshold is basically a magic line in the sand where error correction goes from hurting to helping," he says. Google has now passed that line, in part with a new, 107-qubit chip. Previously the researchers had shown that as the size of their logical qubit increased, its error rate edged down just slightly. Now, they have improved things so that, as the logical qubit expands from nine to 25 to 49 physical data qubits, the error rate falls by a factor of two at each step. The largest logical qubit has a lifetime of 291 microseconds, 2.4 times longer than any of the physical qubits. "This is indeed a very convincing demonstration of error suppression improving exponentially with the [grid] size," says Barbara Terhal, a physicist at the Technical University of Delft. "Google is the first team to achieve this." That may be open to debate. In December 2023 researchers at Harvard University who use individual atoms as qubits showed they could reduce the error rate in a logical qubit by encoding it on bigger grids of atoms. In 2022, a team at Yale University demonstrated beyond-threshold error correction in an experiment in which the qubits were modes of microwaves in a hollow aluminum cylinder. However, the Google team did something unprecedented, says John Preskill, a theoretical physicist at the California Institute of Technology: They decoded the ancillary qubits repeatedly on the fly, which will be essential for using logical qubits in computation. Google can now attempt basic operations with two or more logical qubits, says Charina Chou, Google Quantum AI's chief operating officer. "You can imagine having multiple smaller logical qubits instead of one bigger logical qubit, and testing out those interacting with each other." But the team still has a long way to their goal of a 1-million-qubit, fully error-corrected machine, notes Irfan Siddiqi, a physicist at the University of California, Berkeley. And they could hit serious snags along the way. In the new work "the physics is great," Siddiqi says. "But I wouldn't buy stock just yet."