Dario Gil, who leads IBM's quantum computing and artificial intelligence research division, said Friday that the company's scientists have successfully built and measured a processor prototype with 50 quantum bits, known as qubits.
Gil says it's the first time any company has built a quantum computer at this scale.
Quantum computing, a technology that's still in its early phases, uses the quirks of quantum physics to perform calculations at far higher speeds than current computers.
'Quantum computing promises to be able to solve certain problems – such as chemical simulations and types of optimization – that will forever be beyond the practical reach of classical machines,' IBM said.
In a recent Nature paper, the IBM Q team pioneered a new way to look at chemistry problems using quantum hardware that could one day transform the way new drugs and materials are discovered, for instance.
IBM also announced it will allow customer to access a slightly slower version of the system online for the first time.
'We are, and always have been, focused on building technology with the potential to create value for our clients and the world,' said Dario Gil, vice president of AI and IBM Q, IBM Research.
'The ability to reliably operate several working quantum systems and putting them online was not possible just a few years ago.
'Now, we can scale IBM processors up to 50 qubits due to tremendous feats of science and engineering.
'These latest advances show that we are quickly making quantum systems and tools available that could offer an advantag
Seth Lloyd, an MIT mechanical engineering professor not involved in IBM's research, says it's likely that IBM still has glitches to work out but the 50-qubit announcement is a sign of significant progress.
The first IBM systems available online to clients will have a 20 qubit processor,
Over 60,000 users have run over 1.7M quantum experiments and generated over 35 third-party research publications using IBM's system, the firm said.
Users have registered from over 1500 universities, 300 high schools, and 300 private institutions worldwide, many of whom are accessing the IBM Q experience as part of their formal education.
'I use the IBM Q experience and QISKit as an integral part of my classroom teaching on quantum computing, and I cannot emphasize enough how important it is.
'In prior years, the course was interesting theoretically, but felt like it described some far off future,' said Andrew Houck, professor of electrical engineering, Princeton University.
'Thanks to this incredible resource that IBM offers, I have students run actual quantum algorithms on a real quantum computer as part of their assignments!'
'Being able to work on IBM's quantum hardware and have access through an open source platform like QISKit has been crucial in helping us to understand what algorithms--and real-world use cases--might be viable to run on near-term processors,' said Matt Johnson, CEO, QC Ware.
'Simulators don't currently capture the nuances of the actual quantum hardware platforms, and nothing is more convincing for a proof-of-concept than results obtained from an actual quantum processor.'
