Summer Myatt
With an increased emphasis on quantum computing across the federal landscape, it may sometimes feel like full-scale quantum capabilities are just around the corner. But although physicists, scientists and experts have been working on quantum problems for nearly a century, we’re not as close to a quantum future as we may think.
Dr. Ken Urquhart, global vice president of 5G strategy at Zscaler, told Executive Mosaic in a new video interview that we may be 50 years away from achieving the next iteration of quantum capabilities.
“Truth is, there’s some encryption models we use today that may not be cracked for at least another 50 years at the speed of how quantum computing is progressing,” he said in conversation with Executive Mosaic’s Summer Myatt. “There’s even some that are not amenable to quantum computing, meaning we have encryption algorithms that are just as hard to crack in quantum computing as with classical computing.”
While many quantum effects are still distant, Dr. Urquhart said we are already seeing some forms of quantum computing capabilities today, but just not quite at the scale we need to get to the next generation of quantum.
“IBM, one of the world’s leaders, has a 433-qubit computer and it’s trying to go to push 1,000 and then 4,000 bits,” he shared. “In a lot of problems, it’s still not enough. Universal quantum computing, they think 10 to 50 years off. That’s not my estimate, this is people who are actually working it every day and looking at what is the art of the possible.”
Watch Dr. Urquhart’s full video interview here to learn more about the future of quantum in the federal landscape.
