When should CIOs care about quantum computing?

Quantum computing is still years away from widespread adoption, but CIOs in some industries should start paying attention now.

Quantum computers process information differently from traditional computers, using quantum bits, or qubits, that can represent multiple possible states simultaneously rather than just 0 or 1. This allows them to solve certain complex problems more efficiently than conventional computers. The technology is still developing, but one type of quantum computing called quantum annealing is already providing value for organizations with complex optimization problems, such as those in logistics and transportation. Future gate-based quantum computers could also unlock new capabilities, such as more accurate simulations of molecular interactions for pharmaceutical and manufacturing companies.

In the following Q&A, Brian Jackson, principal research director at Info-Tech Research Group, explains where quantum computing stands today, which industries should explore it first and how CIOs can prepare. He also discusses why partnerships could help organizations gain an early advantage and the risks quantum computing poses to current encryption methods.

Editor's note: The following transcript was edited for brevity and clarity.

Where does quantum computing actually stand right now?

Brian Jackson: It's made rapid advances over the last few years, and many players are interested in making gate-based quantum computing a reality -- gate-based being the same style of computing that we use today on more conventional hardware. However, there's still so far to go and so many questions to resolve before we know whether this technology will provide commercial value.

We're still not resolved on the best way to approach it, even from the hardware level.

Over the last few years, confidence has gone way up, and more people believe we'll achieve this within a few years. That said, we're still not resolved on the best way to approach it, even from the hardware level. If you look at what Google, Amazon, IBM and all these startups like Xanadu and PsiQuantum are doing, they all have competing hardware approaches to control the qubits -- the most fundamental part of the quantum computing processor. It's hard to know which method is going to be the one that wins.

For CIOs who are focused on immediate priorities like AI, cybersecurity and cloud costs, why should quantum computing be on their radar?

Jackson: First, there's the threat implied by quantum computing. If we have functioning quantum computers in the future, they could execute what's called Shor's algorithm, which could crack many of today's encryption methods and render them obsolete.

This is where we get into conversations about national-level defense and having initiatives to upgrade encryption across all systems -- both commercial and government. When we talk about these new encryption standards and post-quantum cryptography, it's about replacing your current encryption standards with new ones. That doesn't require your enterprise to have a quantum computer. It just means you work with your tech providers and vendors -- and maybe your own systems -- where you use encryption.

Then there's the opportunity side, which is more interesting, but also more speculative. There's one branch where there's value being deployed today with quantum annealing -- and D-Wave is the main manufacturer that's achieving that. Then there's the gate-based quantum computers. None of those computers are ready to provide a business advantage today. They're in development.

Are there certain industries that should be thinking about quantum sooner than others?

Jackson: Yes. Quantum annealing is ready to provide some value in the market today. It's often overlooked because there's so much focus on the potential of gate-based quantum computers. If you have any optimization problems like telecommunications, logistics and transportation companies do -- optimization problems with a lot of variables -- then you might consider quantum annealing.

Quantum annealing is ready to provide some value in the market today.

We're seeing commercial deployments today across several sectors, including telecommunications and logistics, that provide incremental value in improving business processes. With gate-based quantum computing, the biggest opportunity is the ability to simulate the quantum layer of reality -- the quantum mechanics that underpin the molecular interactions underlying things such as chemical reactions and pharmaceutical drugs. Any high-energy molecular interaction is difficult for conventional computers to simulate. If that's the type of business problem you have, like an aerospace or pharmaceutical company, then you'd be interested in quantum computing.

Say you're in an industry where quantum computing could have a big effect. What should CIOs be doing today to prepare for that future?

Jackson: If you want to be one of the enterprises at the absolute bleeding edge of this, partnerships are going to be key. There are a limited number of people and organizations pushing the envelope in quantum computing. Can you work with one of these startups or tech giants and give them a test bed of business domain problems where they could use their breakthroughs on real-world problems? That's very valuable.

Partnerships are going to be key.

Aside from that, the closest function companies have today to an internal quantum computing specialty team would be high-performance computing. It's similar, because you're taking specialized processors that aren't conventional and can't do every type of computing workload and harnessing them to answer specialized questions and take on unique workloads for your company. If you're already investing in high-performance computing, you'll likely want to start thinking about how quantum computing fits into it as another variety of high-performance computing.

In the AI world, there's a lot of vendor hype that CIOs must be aware of. Is there any quantum computing hype happening right now?

Jackson: There's definitely hype, and quantum computing is often brought up as a way to push AI's capabilities even higher. There are two ways that quantum computing can contribute. First, quantum computing can create synthetic data to help train AI. That's potentially the more useful and verified application.

The other potential avenue for AI is, 'Can quantum computing actually provide more compute power than the GPUs and the specialized ASIC chips that these tech giants are manufacturing today?' So far, there's less evidence that this will be the case. Some scientific papers report evidence that it could do that, but commercially, it's a long way off.

Is there anything else on this topic that's important for CIOs?

The annealing aspect of it gets undersold.

Jackson: The annealing aspect of it gets undersold. I collaborated closely with D-Wave on a blueprint, which I published with Info-Tech alongside other quantum computing manufacturers and people developing this space. If you're looking for quantum value today, this is the space to look. We have clear commercial contracts, clear deployments and companies that have realized business optimizations and savings from deploying quantum computers.

If you want to get away from the theoretical space, you should start with the optimization problems that these quantum annealers have been proven to help with.

Tim Murphy is a site editor and writer for the IT Strategy team at TechTarget.