Organizations are starting to increase their quantum computing budgets, and many companies believe adopting the technology is becoming a competitive necessity, but just try to concisely explain quantum computing to a friend at a party–-it can’t be done. (This is assuming the person you are talking to doesn’t walk away to freshen their cocktail at the mere mention of quantum computing.)
All of the above and more are among the findings of a new study, “The First Annual Report on Enterprise Quantum Computing Adoption,” commissioned by quantum software firm Zapata Computing.
The study, based on a survey of 300 corporate enterprise leaders conducted by Wakefield Research, revealed that 28% of enterprises surveyed now have quantum computing budgets over $1 million, a major departure from the $100,000 “toe in the water” budgets of the recent past, according to Zapata.
Meanwhile, 74% of those surveyed agreed “those who fail to adopt quantum computing will fall behind.” About 41% of firms that have begun building quantum capabilities expect to achieve a competitive advantage over their industry peers within the next two years. Some are moving even more quickly: 12% of adopters expect to achieve some competitive advantage within one year — or already have, the study noted.
Christopher Savoie, CEO of Zapata, said in a statement, “We’re already seeing how the leaders in quantum adoption are separating themselves from the rest of the pack. They are starting to build solutions that strategically leverage today’s quantum devices within mostly classical applications. Those that are the furthest ahead aren’t just investing in quantum to avoid losing — they’re playing to win.”
The use cases they are addressing are often related to machine learning and data analytics, as 71% of those surveyed reported they are most interested in those use cases.
Still, organizations adopting quantum computing are running into some of the same fears and challenges that early adopters of other emerging technologies historically have faced, such as vendor lock-in. Almost all survey respondents–96% of respondents agreed that they could not successfully adopt quantum computing without the help of a trusted vendor, but 73% were concerned about getting locked-in to a single full-stack vendor. This suggests hardware-agnostic, interoperable approaches to quantum adoption could be highly valued in the years to come.
Complexity also continues to be a challenge, as 49% of respondents perceived that the biggest hurdle to quantum adoption was the complexity of integrating quantum computing with their existing IT stack. This is significant because for the foreseeable future quantum and classical computing architectures will exist in a hybrid state even in the most aggressive quantum-adopting enterprises.
It’s no surprise that complexity continues to be an issue. That is the case with most technologies when they are still new, and is to be expected with the especially esoteric notions–superposition, entanglement of electrons, etc.--that characterize quantum computing. This was reflected in another study finding: 96% of respondents said they would need more than 10 minutes to explain quantum computing to a friend at a party.