New entry in commercial quantum computing, using entirely different tech

Enlarge / Honeywell's ion trap hardware. (credit: Honeywell)

Over the years, academics developed a variety of systems that you could run quantum algorithms on. Most of these had one or two helpful traits-easy to manipulate or able to hold their state for longer-but lacked enough of the others to keep them from being practical computing solutions. Over the last few years, however, a number of companies have figured out how to manufacture significant numbers of solid-state qubits called transmons. Because the fabrication technology for transmons is similar to that of existing chipmaking, lots of the major players in the nascent market-including Google, IBM, and Rigetti-have settled on transmons.

But transmons aren't ideal either. They require extremely cold temperatures, show significant device-to-device variability, and are good but not great at holding their state. A number of people in the field I've talked to have suggested there's still room for another technology to surpass transmons, and Ars' own Chris Lee is putting his money on that happening.

Now, a company new to the quantum computing market is also betting it will. Honeywell, a company better known as a defense contractor and materials supplier, is announcing that it has built a quantum computer using an alternate technology called "ion trap" and will be making it available via Microsoft's Azure cloud service later this year. The company also claims that, by some measures, it's the most powerful quantum computer yet built, but that's a claim that needs to be considered very carefully.

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