*

Microsoft ( MSFT ) says its quantum chip is less prone to errors

than

rivals

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Chip is a hybrid between semiconductors and

superconductors

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Microsoft ( MSFT ) says chip has fewer qubits than rivals but

easier to

scale up

By Stephen Nellis

Feb 19 (Reuters) - Microsoft ( MSFT ) on Wednesday

unveiled a new chip that it said showed quantum computing is

"years, not decades" away, joining Google and IBM ( IBM ) in predicting

that a fundamental change in computing technology is much closer

than recently believed.

Quantum computing holds the promise of carrying out

calculations that would take today's systems millions of years

and could unlock discoveries in medicine, chemistry and many

other fields where near-infinite seas of possible combinations

of molecules confound classical computers.

Quantum computers also hold the danger of upending today's

cybersecurity systems, where most encryption relies on the

assumption that it would take too long to brute force gain

access.

The biggest challenge of quantum computers is that a

fundamental building block called a qubit, which is similar to a

bit in classical computing, is incredibly fast but also

extremely difficult to control and prone to errors.

Microsoft ( MSFT ) said the Majorana 1 chip it has developed is less

prone to those errors than rivals and provided as evidence a

scientific paper set to be published in academic journal Nature.

When useful quantum computers will arrive has become a topic

of debate in the upper echelons of the tech industry. Nvidia ( NVDA )

CEO Jensen Huang said last month that the technology

was two decades away from overtaking his company's chips, the

workhorses of artificial intelligence, reflecting broad

skepticism.

Those remarks prompted Google, which last year showed off

its own new quantum chip, to say that commercial quantum

computing applications are only five years away. IBM ( IBM ) has said

large-scale quantum computers will be online by 2033.

Microsoft's ( MSFT ) Majorana 1 has been in the works for nearly two

decades and relies on a subatomic particle called the Majorana

fermion whose existence was first theorized in the 1930s. That

particle has properties that make it less prone to the errors

that plague quantum computers, but it has been hard for

physicists to find and control.

Microsoft ( MSFT ) said it created the Majorana 1 chip with indium

arsenide and aluminum. The device uses a superconducting

nanowire to observe the particles and can be controlled with

standard computing equipment.

The chip Microsoft ( MSFT ) revealed Wednesday has far fewer qubits

than rival chips from Google and IBM ( IBM ), but

Microsoft ( MSFT ) believes that far fewer of its Majorana-based qubits

will be needed to make useful computers because the error rates

are lower.

Microsoft ( MSFT ) did not give a timeline for when the chip would be

scaled up to create quantum computers that can outstrip today's

machines, but the company said in a blog post that point was

"years, not decades" away.

Jason Zander, the Microsoft ( MSFT ) executive vice president who

oversees the company's long-term strategic bets, described

Majorana 1 as a "high risk, high reward" strategy.

The chip was fabricated at Microsoft ( MSFT ) labs in Washington

state and Denmark.

"The hardest part has been solving the physics. There is no

textbook for this, and we had to invent it," Zander said in an

interview with Reuters. "We literally have invented the ability

to go create this thing, atom by atom, layer by layer."

Philip Kim, a professor of physics at Harvard University who

was not involved in Microsoft's ( MSFT ) research, said that Majorana

fermions have been a hot topic among physicists for decades and

called Microsoft's ( MSFT ) work an "exciting development" that put the

company at the forefront of quantum research.

He also said that Microsoft's ( MSFT ) use of a hybrid between

traditional semiconductors and exotic superconductors appeared

to be a good route toward chips that can be scaled up into more

powerful chips.

"Although there's no demonstration (of this scaling up) yet,

what they are doing is really successful," Kim said.