What the release of Microsoft’s Azure Quantum to the public means for us moving forward
On February 1, 2021, Microsoft announced the launch of its cloud-based platform which will allow anyone to use quantum hardware tools called Azure Quantum. This platform has curated resources from its partners (Honeywell, IONQ, Quantum Circuits, and 1Qloud) to provide what they claim to be “some of the most compelling and diverse quantum resources available.”
They are offering users a free hour to test some of their available solutions. After this hour, testing basic services will cost about $10 per hour (full pricing table below).
Microsoft originally announced the release of its Quantum Development Kit, quantum focused programming language Q#, and quantum simulators in December of 2017. This technology was then made available to select Microsoft partners in May of 2020. We are now seeing that it is publicly available. Microsoft has made significant strides in this space in the past few years.
In order to start working with Azure’s quantum computing solution, one will need to learn how to use their Quantum Development Kit, Q# language, and Quantum Intermediate Representation (QIR).
This is a very exciting development in quantum computing. IBM suggests that this technology could be a catalyst for development in many fields:
Quantum computers could spur the development of new breakthroughs in science, medication to save lives, machine learning methods to diagnose illness sooner, materials to make more efficient devices and structures, financial strategies to live well in retirement, and algorithms to quickly direct resources such as ambulances — IBM Quantum
Quantum computing will give us the ability to model things that are too large for the current computing memory solutions we are capable of building. The example that IBM’s quantum computing page gives for an application of quantum computing is in chemistry where the total number of quantum states in some molecules is too large for current memory capabilities to model accurately.
Microsoft explains that Quantum computers rely on units called qubits which represent superpositions of zeros and ones rather than typical bits that rely on ones and zeros. These qubits are very unstable and require temperatures around absolute zero to remain stable. Microsoft has been working with partners for years to develop a scalable system that allows computers to use the power of qubits. Microsoft’s research team has successfully created a cryogenic quantum control platform that can take inputs from thousands of qubits. They call the chip that powers this platform Gooseberry which is able to operate at extremely low temperatures without dissipating significant power. A detailed report of their research is publicly available in this paper and I recommend you check out their page describing their other innovative solutions if you are interested in learning how they have solved some other problems surrounding quantum computing (it’s very interesting).
Microsoft is now the first full-stack public cloud ecosystem for quantum solutions in the world. Their investment in researching and developing these solutions and building partnerships with other quantum computing companies has paid off. They have successfully expanded this technology to provide it at scale to the public.
Microsoft has a few case studies on some of the applications of quantum computing in optimization, chemistry (specifically within energy and utilities), financial services, and logistics.
Within optimization problems, Microsoft claims that the complexity scale of many problems we would like to solve with normal computers are unsolvable. They argue that quantum computing will change the domain of what we can solve:
Quantum computers can naturally represent random distributions as quantum states, and therefore have the potential to provide better solutions than today’s classical optimization algorithms.
In this optimization case study, they demonstrate in the context of reducing traffic congestion, that they were able to reduce congestion by 70% in studies with up to 5000 vehicles. Their solution also took just 0.02 seconds to run (compared to previous quantum annealing machines taking 20 seconds to solve the same problem).
Microsoft also argues that quantum computers will eventually be able to crack the public key cryptography solutions we have been using since 1994. They are working on adjusting cryptographic standards for board uses in the financial sector and in secured communications.
The emergence of quantum computing into the public space provides both the potential for solutions to problems that were once unsolvable with modern computers and also introduces risks we haven’t yet considered.
It will be interesting to see what solutions people are able to solve with this new technology now that it is available to the public. This technology is still in its infancy and there is a lot of room for development in interesting and dangerous directions.
