April 3 (Reuters) - Microsoft ( MSFT ) and Quantinuum on

Wednesday said they have achieved a key step in making quantum

computers a commercial reality by making them more reliable.

The move is the latest in a race to perfect quantum

computing in which tech firms such as Microsoft ( MSFT ), Alphabet's

Google and IBM ( IBM ) are jostling with both rivals

and nation states to create machines that take advantage of

quantum mechanics to promise speeds far faster than conventional

silicon-based computers. Those quantum machines could make

feasible scientific calculations that would otherwise take

millions of years with today's classical computers.

But the fundamental unit of quantum computers - called a

"qubit" - is fast but finicky, producing data errors if the

quantum computer is even slightly disturbed. To solve that

problem, quantum researchers often build more physical qubits

than needed and use error-correction techniques to yield a

smaller number of reliable and useful qubits.

Microsoft ( MSFT ) and Quantinuum said they had made a breakthrough

in that field. Microsoft ( MSFT ) applied an error-correction algorithm

that it wrote to Quantinuum's physical qubits, yielding about

four reliable qubits from 30 physical ones.

Jason Zander, Microsoft's ( MSFT ) executive vice president for

strategic missions and technologies, said the company believes

that is the best ratio of reliable qubits from a quantum chip

that has ever been shown.

"We ran more than 14,000 individual experiments without a

single error. That's up to 800 times better than anything on

record," Zander told Reuters in an interview.

Microsoft ( MSFT ) said it plans to release the technology to its

cloud computing customers in the coming months.

Quantum researchers, both at Quantinuum and its rivals,

often cite a figure of about 100 reliable qubits as the number

needed to beat a conventional supercomputer. Neither Microsoft ( MSFT )

nor Quantinuum on Wednesday would say how many more years they

will need to use the new technique to hit 100 reliable qubits.

But Ilyas Khan, the chief product officer of Quantinuum,

said, "The current view is that we have lopped at least two

years off that, if not more."