Company
Overview
D-Wave is pioneering the development of a new class of high performance computing system. These systems are architected around an innovative processor that uses a computational model known as adiabatic quantum computing (AQC). These processors are fabricated using superconducting metals instead of semiconductors and are operated at ultra-low temperatures in a magnetic vacuum. They are designed explicitly to harness quantum mechanical effects to fundamentally and dramatically reduce the time and memory requirements for computation.
The systems under development enable a class of algorithms called adiabatic quantum optimization algorithms. These algorithms, and the systems being built to support them, are specifically designed to solve complex search and optimization problems in the service of high value scientific and commercial applications.
The company is currently in the R&D phase of designing, fabricating, testing and operating AQCs and the software systems required to program and use them. Initially, D-Wave will target sales of systems to institutions who wish to conduct cutting edge research in experimental and theoretical quantum information science.
Why is This Work Important?
The largest experimental quantum computers available today are on the order of 10 quantum bits (qubits) in a non-scalable hardware platform (liquid state NMR). D-Wave is currently designing, fabricating, testing and operating processors with 128 qubits. The company’s approach is expected to be scalable in the medium term (2010-2011) to tens of thousands of qubits. Ultimately it should be possible with variants of the current approach to design, construct and operate systems with millions of qubits.
Such systems promise to be able to solve high-value problems that are in principle unsolvable with any classical computing system across a broad spectrum of applications categories, including bioinformatics, quantum simulation, artificial intelligence, cryptanalysis, scheduling, routing and logistics. Success in maturation of the company’s technology will provide a long-term defensible position as the dominant supplier of a new category of high performance computing system.
Adiabatic Quantum Computing
D-Wave’s focus is the development of superconducting AQC processors and the infrastructure required to design, fabricate, test and operate them. The company has focused on AQC because it is passively protected against noise-induced decoherence in a way that competing models (in particular the gate model of quantum computation) are not.
An adiabatic quantum algorithm proceeds by slowly changing the values of currents sent to the processor, which is operated at near absolute zero temperature in a magnetic vacuum. These currents are the machine language of the processor. After changes to the currents are complete, the qubits are read out. The algorithm succeeds—and the optimal solution to the optimization problem is returned—if the processor is in its lowest energy state when the readouts are fired. In AQC, only slowly varying signals are required—there is no need for high frequency control. This vastly simplifies engineering of the I/O, processor and electronics systems.
Superconducting Processors
There are many possible hardware platforms from which a quantum computer can be built. The company has focused exclusively on superconducting electronics. The primary reason for this choice is the possibility of building a fabrication line that is identical to that used in best practices semiconductor fabrication, aiming for VLSI capability in superconducting processor fabrication of the same standards as those expected in the semiconductor industry. None of the competing concepts for quantum computing hardware platforms are amenable to this approach.
D-Wave’s Infrastructure and High-Throughput Experimental Approach
D-Wave has adopted a high-throughput experimentally-driven approach to converting the basic science of quantum computation into useful technologies in as short a time as possible. This approach requires superb infrastructure, the keystone of which is the company’s chip fabrication foundry.
D-Wave’s fabrication line follows best practices from the semiconductor industry, achieving levels of integration unprecedented in the world of superconducting electronics. In addition to the company’s exceptional fabrication capability, D-Wave employs expert teams of circuit designers, experimental physicists, system engineers and specialists in quantum algorithm and software development. Additionally D-Wave has sourced and nurtured a large and dedicated team of commercial suppliers for key components of the systems, including cryogenics, electronics, packaging and classical algorithm and software development.
Intellectual Property
D-Wave currently owns almost 50 granted US patents and has over 140 pending patent applications worldwide. These cover inventions related to superconducting adiabatic quantum computation, the physical devices from which AQCs can be constructed, a multitude of processor architectures, methods for programming large numbers of qubits, innovations in the systems that support the processor (cryogenics, I/O, electronics, packaging), software and general modes of use.
Product Overview
The company’s first product will comprise a 128-qubit superconducting AQC processor and all support infrastructure required to operate it. This includes a 15mK base temperature pulse tube dilution refrigerator, I/O, electronics, magnetic vacuum and software systems. The system is designed to be used in an expert-level environment, such as those found in national labs and corporate research centers. The system provides programming access at several layers of abstraction, ranging from a very low level machine language interface identical to that which D-Wave scientists use to interact with the processor, to a web services interface that can treat the system as a black box optimization engine.
Summary
D-Wave is dedicated to developing and deploying the first commercial AQCs, making the vast power of quantum computation available to a broad base of researchers and practitioners.
The company has developed significant infrastructure and technology in its focus area of superconducting AQC, including a superconducting fabrication line following best practices from the semiconductor industry. This fabrication line is a resource that is unique to the company.
The company has the support of a blue-chip investor base including Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Goldman Sachs, Harris & Harris, GrowthWorks, the Business Development Bank of Canada, and International Investment Underwriting.
D-Wave’s intellectual property portfolio includes almost 50 granted US patents. These include granted claims which are foundational to the operation of any superconducting quantum computer.
The company’s first product is a field deployable experimental system, comprising a 128-qubit processor, and all of the support systems required to use it. This system will be available for purchase as early as Q4/2009. Its intended mode of use is as a vehicle for doing research in quantum information science in an expert-level environment such as those found in national labs and corporate research centers.
