by - Amazon managers are skeptical about the breakthrough claims of Microsoft’s Quantum Computing.
- She called one Amazon -Exec “Next Level (in BS and Hype).”
- The recent quantum announcements of tech giants can be more hype than content, other experts suggested.
Microsoft claimed a large breakthrough of Quantum Computing last month. Amazon managers don’t buy it.
On February 19, Microsoft unveiled a quantum processor called Majorana 1. The company said that the chip uses a new type of architecture with which quantum computers can store much more data and perform much more complex calculations.
On the same day e -mailed Simone Severini, the head of Amazon’s head of Quantum Technologies, CEO Andy Jassy -doubt about Microsoft’s claims, according to a copy of the E -mail obtained by Business Insider.
Severini wrote that the underlying scientific article by Microsoft, released in nature, “does not” do not show “the claimed performance and only demonstrated that the new chip could make future experiments possible. “
He added that Microsoft had a checkered history of “different withdrawn articles due to scientific misconduct” in the Quantum Computing space. The E -mail was also shared with various other managers, including Amazon Web Services CEO Matt Garman and James Hamilton, a senior vice president.
“This seems to be a meaningful technical progress, but it is very different from the breakthrough that is depicted in the media,” wrote Severini.
It is also far from clear that the architecture of Microsoft, which uses ‘Topological Qubits’, will offer ‘any real performance advantage’, he added.
Simone Severini, head of the Quantum Technologies of Amazon Web Services. Amazon
‘Next level (in BS and Hype)’
In Internal Slacle -BIs from BIZon -Execs and employees were more vocal about their frustration with the Microsoft claims.
Oskar painter, Amazon’s head of Quantum Hardware, said it was necessary to “reduce BS statements such as S. Nadella’s”, probably in referral to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella’s social media post who proclaimed important progress with the Majorana chip.
Painter, who also teaches Caltech, said he had more positive views of the quantum computer efforts of Google and IBM. Microsoft, on the other hand, is “next level (in BS and hype)”, he wrote in an internal weak message seen by BI.
An Amazon -employee joked about receiving texts from friends asking if this would ‘change the world’, while another pretple at technology companies that used grandiose explanations to promote their quantum efforts.
“It seems that the marketing teams from Google, IBM and Microsoft are making faster progress than their hardware -r & d teams,” this person wrote on Slack.
‘Insignificant’ compared to what is needed
Technology companies have been working on Quantum Computing for years. The hope is to make machines in one day that make significant steps possible in areas such as discovering medicines or making chemical connections. Amazon and Google have also revealed new quantum chips in recent months.
But their efforts to surpass each other can generate more hype than substance, say industry experts.
Arka Majumdar, professor of computer technology at the University of Washington, said BI that the technological performance of Microsoft was impressive but “insignificant” compared to what is needed to create a useful quantum computer. He added that the claims of Microsoft seemed “Sensational” and “Overhyped”, given that it had not reached a meaningful scale.
Scott Aaronson, a renowned researcher of Quantum Computing and Professor in computer science at the University of Texas in Austin, said in a blog post that Microsoft’s statement has created a topological Qubit “has not yet been accepted by Peer Review.”
The Peer Review file of the Microsoft nature report says that the “Results in this manuscript do not represent evidence for the presence of Majorana Nul -Modi in the reported devices” and that the work is intended to introduce an architecture that makes “Fusion experiments possible with the help of future Majorana zero -Modi -Modi -Modi -Modi
In an e -mail to BI, a Microsoft spokesperson said that the natural paper was published a year after the entry and the company had made “enormous progress” at that time. Microsoft plans to share extra data “in the coming weeks and months,” the spokesperson added.
“Discours and skepticism are all part of the scientific process,” said Microsoft’s spokesperson. “That is why we are committed to the continuous open publication of our research, so that everyone can build on what others have discovered and learned.”
Quantum time lines
Amazon and Microsoft also have various views on the expected timeline for practical quantum use.
The Microsoft spokesperson said BI: “Quantum computers on the scale scale were only removed for years, not decades.” But a Amazon spokesperson said they had expected adoption for a few decades before the mainstream.
“Although quantum computers may not be commercially viable for 10-20 years, bringing Kwantum Computing to Bloom will make an extraordinary effort, including persistent interest and investments in industry that now from industry from now on,” Amazon’s spokesperson told BI.
Chris Balance, the CEO of the Quantum Computing Startup Oxford Ionics, said BI that the recent announcement of Amazon was just as vague with little substance. Other experts from the industry previously said BI that they were not sure whether the technology had been demanded what these companies are claiming.
Nevertheless, Balance said that the recent series of KwantumNieuws is a “good sign” for the industry, which is still in its “very early days”.
“It shows that people wake up with the value of Quantum Computing and the need to tackle this in their road cards,” said Balance.
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