The race to shape the future of computing is heating up among tech companies, with Microsoft saying on Wednesday it has made a major breakthrough in quantum computing, potentially paving the way for the technology to address complex scientific and societal challenges.
Scientists at the tech giant have spent 17 years developing a new material and framework for quantum computing to help power its new Majorana 1 processor. Microsoft is calling the advancement the world's first quantum processor powered by topological qubits, the fundamental units of quantum computation. The company published its latest research in the journal Nature.
Unlike traditional computers, quantum computers can process massive amounts of data at the same time in ways that could revolutionize fields such as science, medicine, energy and artificial intelligence. However, quantum computing is prone to errors because of the instability of qubits.
But Microsoft said its new topoconductor -- made of a new material that combines indium arsenide (a semiconductor) and aluminum (a superconductor) -- can perform tasks with greater speed and accuracy than traditional qubits. The Majorana 1 chip is designed to scale up to 1 million qubits on a single, compact chip.
The news comes as several tech companies race to advance quantum computing. In December, Google unveiled its latest quantum computing chip called Willow, claiming it can complete a complex computing challenge in 5 minutes that would take one of today's fastest supercomputers longer than 10 septillion years.
Microsoft said it's on track to build the world's first fault-tolerant, scalable quantum computer within years rather than decades. The effort is part of an initiative by the US government's Defense Advanced Research Project Agency designed to make quantum computing practical for the real world.
"Quantum computing has long promised revolutionary breakthroughs, but progress has been slow," Brian Hopkins, a principal analyst at Forrester, told CNET. "We see these announcements as steps in the long road to quantum advantage -- the point at which a quantum computer becomes commercially practical."
Although it's still unclear which company will take the lead, this marks a significant moment for Microsoft because now it has a chip in the game.
"Historically, we've seen early pioneers pave the way for competitors, who rethink the technology and run away with the competition," Hopkins said.
At the same time, however, he noted IBM's Watson pioneered natural language interfaces only to be upstaged by Google DeepMind, OpenAI and others.