Shares of Google parent Alphabet soared as much as 6% on Tuesday after the company teased a major breakthrough with its new quantum computing chip “Willow.”
The “Willow” chip takes less than five minutes to solve a problem that would take a current “leading supercomputer” about 10 septillion years to solve – or “far beyond the age of the universe,” according to Google CEO Sundar Pichai.
“We see Willow as an important step in our journey to build a useful quantum computer with practical applications in areas like drug discovery, fusion energy, battery design + more,” Pichai said in a post on X.
The stock surge helped push Alphabet shares to their highest level since July.
Company shares have been under pressure in recent months due to investor concerns that Google will be broken as part of the landmark antitrust case targeting its online search empire.
Pichai’s announcement impressed billionaire Elon Musk, who responded, “Wow.”
“We should do a quantum cluster in space with Starship one day:)” Pichai replied.
Musk has his own artificial intelligence startup xAI that competes with Google and is a major customer for chip supplier Nvidia.
He is also founder of SpaceX, which manufactures the Starship space shuttle and Starlink satellite internet service.
Quantum computers use subatomic quantum bits, or “qubits,” to process data much faster than conventional binary computers.
Since the qubits are known to be error-prone, Google and other competitors have been searching for ways to make the devices more reliable.
Google did not include any concrete examples of real-world applications for Willow in a blog post detailing the breakthrough.
However, the company said Willow “can reduce errors exponentially as we scale up using more qubits” and “cracks a key challenge in quantum error correction.”
While it is likely years away from mainstream adoption, the technology is expected to play a key role in the development of advanced AI systems.
“Willow marks an important step toward the eventual commercialization of quantum computing — something that could have significant implications for many industries, as well as data and national security,” Baird analyst Colin Sebastian said regarding the announcement, according to Bloomberg.
