Google exec: practical quantum computing is five years out

Google will start offering commercial quantum computing services within five years, the head of Google Quantum AI told Reuters. “We’re optimistic that within five years we’ll see real-world applications that are possible only on quantum computers,” Hartmut Neven said.

Neven’s prediction contradicts that of Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, who recently said practical applications are about twenty years out. “If you kind of said 15 years… that’d probably be on the early side. If you said 30, it’s probably on the late side. But if you picked 20, I think a whole bunch of us would believe it,” Huang said at the CES trade show last January.