Understanding quantum computing is critical to preparing your firm for the next leap

As a business executive, you must understand that quantum computing is not a technology that will replace traditional or high-performance computing. Instead, quantum computing will enhance certain computing needs by computing billions or trillions of data points to find the optimal solution.

A simple analogy is that quantum computing is to traditional computing what an airplane is to an automobile. It’s a related solution; while both are modes of transportation, beyond this generalization, their functions and the value they deliver are drastically different.

Quantum computing was on most business and technology executives’ disruption radars until last November when OpenAI’s ChatGPT and its promise of generative AI bulldozed its way to the forefront of the executive agenda. However, putting quantum computing on the back burner is risky, as recent advances have most experts predicting these machines will be available by the end of this decade.

To develop a quantum computing strategy, you need to understand how quantum computing solves tangible business problems

Private and public organizations are beginning to use quantum computers as an advanced means to observe, analyze, and map outcomes of extremely complex and data-intense models. Current quantum computing use cases include the following:

• Mapping global supply chains covering billions of buyers
• Designing materials or machines for developing next-generation aerospace operations
• Identifying new opportunities for mining and exploration
• Harnessing the advances in data and generative AI
• Applying their computational capabilities for life sciences projects

In the not-too-distant future, quantum computing will play a significant role in cybersecurity. Thankfully, we aren’t there yet, so we can save that topic for a future discussion.

Staying abreast of quantum computing use cases will help you allocate your resources and explore its fit for your business

The following are several use cases where firms are working with technology partners to explore how quantum computing can benefit their business.

Global supply chain and logistics needs

Quantum is most needed in areas that require huge compute power to process data to scale. For example, Unisys is helping customers explore using quantum computing to improve the function, accuracy, and profitability needed by global supply and logistics firms that seek to continually optimize planning, scheduling, inventory, and freight carriage to billions of buyers. These tasks require incredibly complex math. It’s not uncommon for billions of data points to be required to route a pallet of goods from manufacturing to the end customer’s doorstep.

Today’s high-performance computers need data “chunked” into batches like pallet and inventory, flight details, or carriage management. A quantum computer can process all the data for the complete value stream, revealing data in a holistic manner rather than in optimized batches that need reassembly.

Healthcare and life sciences

Another example of the need for quantum computing is in vaccine and treatment development. The Cleveland Clinic and IBM use AI, data, high-performance computers, and quantum computers to analyze extremely large amounts of data to understand how pathogens, vaccines, and the human immune system respond to many scenarios to prepare and protect against future events.

Generative AI

The deployment of large language models (LLMs) has proven to be very compute-thirsty, and the constraints of IT infrastructure availability could seriously impede the successful development and scaling of LLMs across enterprises and ecosystems. This is a clear area where quantum could help scale solutions, but we have yet to see much of this in practice as we figure out the best uses for quantum.

Post-COVID, Moderna and IBM are exploring how all the data from the development of mRNA science and case studies from the past several years may shape future discoveries by bringing qualitative and quantitative data from multiple sources into a single data repository for queries, analysis, probability scenario exploration, and use in virtual experiments and outcomes.

Examples of businesses using quantum computing are evolving in aerospace, financial risk analysis, fraud detection, and automotive manufacturing. These firms are using quantum computing to accelerate their ability to achieve business outcomes. While many of these have yet to be commercialized, their early work on these will become differentiators for their suppliers, partners, and customers when they do.

As an executive, you are not alone in wondering whether your firm is ready for quantum computing

HFS’ OneCouncil is a group of technology, education, and business leaders who lend their experiences and insights to our research on emerging and challenging trends that link technology and business as part of their everyday activities. On the topic of quantum readiness, only 12% of our sample indicated their firm is prepared for the opportunities and risks associated with quantum computing.

Exhibit 1: HFS OneCouncil members admit they are unprepared for quantum computing

Sample: n=16; HFS OneCouncil members, 2023
Source: HFS Research, 2023

Many are unprepared, yet OneCouncil members expect quantum to be here soon. A fourth (25%) expect it to begin impacting their business within five years, and nearly 70% expect an impact by the end of the decade. When asked to describe their knowledge of quantum computing, most members said they knew of it but did not know how to apply it outside the IT department.

Unfortunately, too many leaders see quantum computing as the next leap in computing technology, basing their conclusion on how we’ve seen computers evolve over the past 50 years. The power has increased, but the basics of how these computers work haven’t.

Quantum computing’s unique operating environment requirements demand a radical change in its power and design, and we must understand them better.

It is worth postulating that due to the costs and challenges in operating quantum computers, they will be specialized systems for calculating vast amounts of data—beyond the capabilities of today’s high-performance computers. To properly understand how to plan for quantum computing, business leaders need to cut through the technical jargon to understand how this leap in computing builds on what they have and doesn’t replace current investments in technology or talent.

Quantum computing promises to solve incredibly complex problems faster and more accurately

Too often, we attempt to frame quantum computing as a replacement for traditional computing by applying how we use our iPads, PCs, cloud computing resources, or high-performance computers. Instead, let’s reframe what quantum computing is to explain quantum computing in a manner that articulates the challenges quantum computing can help your organization solve.

If you take nothing else from this research, the most important thing to understand is quantum computing is not an evolution of traditional computing. Understanding this may save your firm billions in R&D investments. Instead, focus your resources on solving problems where quantum can deliver outcomes and value.

Understanding quantum computing begins by realizing it may be a complementary technology, not a replacement for today’s computers

Quantum computing is to traditional computing what an airplane is to an automobile. It’s a related solution; both are modes of transportation, but beyond that generalization, their function and the value they deliver are drastically different.

Let us expand upon this analogy. The automobile, a reference to traditional computing solutions, is built to overcome the process of getting from point A to point B. With a car, we evolved from manual efforts to move goods and deliver services to traversing a defined path more effectively and quickly (e.g., a road) between two locations.

Adopters of this new “technology” quickly benefited. By adding air transportation, firms gained an economic boost from moving people, goods, and information across distances faster, over dedicated routes, and with increased carriage capacity. Like the automobile, the computer, especially when connected to the information superhighway of the internet, adeptly facilitates, analyzes, and exchanges information, commerce, and interactions.

The advent of quantum computing is akin to the advent of air travel. In 1903, when the Wright brothers introduced the concept of the airplane, the need for requiring a defined path along two dimensions (roads) between two points became immaterial. This technology created new economies of scale for social, cultural, and economic change by adopting a third dimension for transporting people, goods, and capabilities.

Quantum computers solve problems like airplanes; they incorporate a new model that operates faster, across multiple dimensions, and with far greater capacity. Yet, we know airplanes didn’t replace cars. Rather, planes and cars continue to co-exist; they serve different needs and facilitate different experiences and outcomes.

Quantum computers are not supercomputers. Quantum computers are not faster automobiles; rather, they are airplanes. They operate to solve different problems at a scale that cars are not designed for. Therefore, the purpose for which you use a traditional computer versus a quantum computer will depend on the objective your firm wants to solve.

This analogy is a simplified difference between quantum computing and traditional computing models; however, it hopefully allows us to recast our expectation that quantum computers (QC) are not meant to replace traditional computing. Using automobile and airplane imagery illustrates quantum computers exist to solve problems at a scale that requires a new approach.

The Bottom Line: Quantum will solve the hardest problems faster and more effectively than traditional computing. But quantum isn’t a replacement for your existing computers; it adds a new dimension to analyzing, computing, and delivering insights for the business.

Unlike traditional computing, built by humans to solve human problems, quantum is understanding how nature works and using nature to achieve new knowledge quickly and efficiently into the complexity of how many things impact one another while working together to achieve a result.

In the next five years, your firm will likely begin to use quantum computing to solve problems where traditional computing cannot effectively or efficiently process the number of variables. With ongoing advancements by IBM, Google, D-Wave, and others in developing quantum computers and the needs of industries like life sciences, supply chain and logistics, aerospace design, cybersecurity, exploration, and others, quantum computing will be critical in finding mission-critical answers to problems current HPCs will never be able to solve effectively.