Microsoft, the company founded by Bill Gates, pioneered computing in the 20th century with its landmark Windows Operating System (OS). Now, the company has come out with the first Quantum Computing Chip, Majorana 1. This chip is said to be able to attain capabilities and resolve issues that modern-day systems cannot.
After 20 Year Pursuit
The company's CEO, Satya Nadella, took to X to share the news.
In his post on the microblogging website, Nadella said, "A couple reflections on the quantum computing breakthrough we just announced."
"Most of us grew up learning there are three main types of matter that matter: solid, liquid, and gas. Today, that changed."
Nadella further added, "After a nearly 20-year pursuit, we’ve created an entirely new state of matter, unlocked by a new class of materials, topoconductors, that enable a fundamental leap in computing."
The company first started working on this in 2004, and it took a different approach, compared to its competitors including Google. Microsoft competitors looked at solving the Achilles heel of the system, the technology’s error rate. The Nadella-led company, instead of focusing on truncating this error rate, took a different approach.
Microsoft connected aluminium nanowires, made out of aluminium oxide, in an H shape and pieced together indium arsenide strips atom-by-atom.
A single qubit is created when the system is induced at each of the letter's four ends after being intricately adjusted with a magnetic field and cooled to almost absolute zero.
Patience & Persistence
Here, a qubit is the basic unit of quantum computing.
Nadella, while talking about the system, further elaborated, saying, "We believe this breakthrough will allow us to create a truly meaningful quantum computer not in decades, as some have predicted, but in years. The qubits created with topoconductors are faster, more reliable, and smaller. They are 1/100th of a millimeter, meaning we now have a clear path to a million-qubit processor. Imagine a chip that can fit in the palm of your hand yet is capable of solving problems that even all the computers on Earth today combined could not!"
"Sometimes researchers have to work on things for decades to make progress possible. It takes patience and persistence to have big impact on the world. And I am glad we get the opportunity to do just that at Microsoft. This is our focus: When productivity rises, economies grow faster, benefiting every sector and every corner of the globe. It’s not about hyping tech; it’s about building technology that truly serves the world.", Nadella added.
Previously, Google's parent company, Alphabet, announced in December that its own new quantum chip required five minutes to reason through a problem that would take existing systems longer.
Microsoft Corp Shares
The company shares closed in green, with major gains at the NYSE. The company shares closed for the day's trade with gains of 1.25 per cent or USD 5.13.
This took the overall value of the company shares to USD 414.77. In addition, the shares increased in value in the after hours trade by another USD 0.80 or 0.19 per cent.
