Book Image

Quantum Computing and Blockchain in Business

By : Arunkumar Krishnakumar
Book Image

Quantum Computing and Blockchain in Business

By: Arunkumar Krishnakumar

Overview of this book

Are quantum computing and Blockchain on a collision course or will they be the most important trends of this decade to disrupt industries and life as we know it? Fintech veteran and venture capitalist Arunkumar Krishnakumar cuts through the hype to bring us a first-hand look into how quantum computing and Blockchain together are redefining industries, including fintech, healthcare, and research. Through a series of interviews with domain experts, he also explores these technologies’ potential to transform national and global governance and policies – from how elections are conducted and how smart cities can be designed and optimized for the environment, to what cyberwarfare enabled by quantum cryptography might look like. In doing so, he also highlights challenges that these technologies have to overcome to go mainstream. Quantum Computing and Blockchain in Business explores the potential changes that quantum computing and Blockchain might bring about in the real world. After expanding on the key concepts and techniques, such as applied cryptography, qubits, and digital annealing, that underpin quantum computing and Blockchain, the book dives into how major industries will be impacted by these technologies. Lastly, we consider how the two technologies may come together in a complimentary way.
Table of Contents (20 chapters)
5
Interview with Dr. Dave Snelling, Fujitsu Fellow
7
Interview with Dr. B. Rajathilagam, Head of AI Research, Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham
9
Interview with Max Henderson, Senior Data Scientist, Rigetti and QxBranch
11
Interview with Sam McArdle, Quantum Computing Researcher at the University of Oxford
14
Interview with Dinesh Nagarajan, Partner, IBM
18
Other Books You May Enjoy
19
Index

Conclusion

We have so far been focusing on industrial applications of quantum computing in all our interviews. We have touched upon applications in financial services, healthcare, smart cities, and even politics. The interview with Sam had a different focus, and that was deliberate. I wanted to focus on one of the key barriers for quantum computing going mainstream – high error rates.

We discussed why error correction in a quantum computer is harder than in a classical computer. The superposition property of qubits makes it harder for us to capture their states. When we observe qubits, their states collapse. These properties of quantum computers make them useful in solving complex algorithms and make information on quantum computers more secure. However, they also make error correction harder as we cannot observe or copy over the information easily.

We touched upon techniques like using shorter circuits and using certain code for certain algorithms and NISQ...