In a significant step reflecting its desire for leadership in the field of quantum computing, Japan has announced the launch of the world’s largest supercomputer dedicated to quantum research, the ABCI-Q system. This announcement is the result of a collaboration between NVIDIA and the Japanese National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST).

This computational giant derives its immense power from being equipped with 2020 advanced NVIDIA H100 graphics processing units. To ensure the highest levels of performance and efficiency, these units are interconnected via ultra-fast NVIDIA Quantum-2 InfiniBand technology. This advanced network architecture provides seamless and efficient communication between the processing units, ensuring efficient execution of complex computational operations.

The ABCI-Q computer also seamlessly integrates with the NVIDIA CUDA-Q platform, an open-source platform for hybrid quantum computing. This platform allows developers to write programs that can be executed not only on NVIDIA GPUs and traditional processors but also on various types of quantum processors. This unique feature enables the system to integrate multiple types of quantum processors developed by leading companies in the field, including the superconducting processor from Fujitsu, the neutral atom processor from Quera, and the photonic quantum processor from Optica. This technical synergy forms a unique hybrid computing system that combines the power of NVIDIA’s graphics processors with the capabilities of diverse quantum processors.

This hybrid system is expected to play a pivotal role in accelerating the pace of research aimed at harnessing the immense potential of quantum processors in solving some of the most complex challenges in vital fields such as advanced artificial intelligence models, complex simulations, and difficult optimization problems. This collaboration represents a promising step towards the actual utilization of the latent power of quantum computing for specific tasks, which may open new horizons and bring about a transformation in many sectors and scientific research.

Japan’s launch of the ABCI-Q computer underscores the growing confidence in the revolutionary potential of quantum computing to address the most complex scientific and industrial challenges in the near future.