Are UK Businesses Set to Benefit from the Quantum AI Revolution?

Are UK businesses set to benefit from the quantum AI revolution

Are UK Businesses Set to Benefit from the Quantum AI Revolution?

Humans, being who they are, are always seeking new ways to improve life. Whether you’re a mum trying to use technology to help with parenting or whatever thing it is, tech innovations always come in very handy. And most probably, you have heard about the ongoing debates on quantum AI and how businesses and organisations are preparing themselves to take advantage of the quantum AI revolution.

Given the potential of this intriguing technology, you’ll definitely want to know how businesses can benefit from it. But even if you have no clue about what quantum AI is all about, you need not worry. This article will go into the depths of this discussion while highlighting some critical trends for UK businesses to take notice of.

What is quantum artificial intelligence (QAI)?

To properly understand QAI, we might need to separate the two technologies a little bit. Let’s start with AI. Do you actually know that according to Statista, its size in the UK market stood at £4.5 billion in 2024? And you’d be surprised to discover that other institutions like the Data City expect this sector to grow to £87.4bn by 2026. Of course, part of the reason for this continued growth is that several people, including mums, have been integrating technology into their daily lives.

Mums, for example, can use it to plan their kids’ meals, create weekly housecleaning schedules and so on. At a time when discussions about work-life balance continue to soar, such possibilities can really be handy. But the challenge with AI is scalability. Imagine the pressure classical computers would have to handle if all the mums in the UK would do this every single day. This is without including AI’s application in other sectors.

Thankfully, quantum computing promises an unmatched processing speed that can help advance AI’s capabilities even more. In fact, Google once reported that their quantum computers were 100 million times more than the normal, traditional machines. So, seeing the UK government invest close to £45 million in its economy in an effort to transform it into a quantum-enabled ecosystem actually makes all the sense.

What is the government doing?

It can be clearly seen that the UK government is at the forefront of ensuring that it doesn’t miss out on anything regarding this revolution. A good example is the £45 million investment we’ve already mentioned. The funding was to help develop a quantum-based brain scanner, which is to enhance the diagnosis of disorders like dementia. A quantum-based smart navigation system for trains was also to be developed to help save costs and improve safety in tunnels.

With this trend, quantum technologies will actually become the backbone of sensing, imaging and communications in the next few years. To add to that, the government is really committed to supporting quantum technologies because it believes they will help grow the economy and offer even better jobs – something that the Prime Minister really looks forward to.

There’s still more. Towards the end of last year (2024), Science Minister Lord Vallance officially opened a new national quantum facility. The laboratory, which is to host about 12 quantum computers, actually provides good grounds for QAI’s further push in the country. And do you know what? Even students using this technology will have an opportunity to further their expertise at this centre.

Good enough, the systems at this centre are not like most of their global counterparts, which are usually restricted to government ownership or use. As long as you have a valid use case, you can actually take advantage of its unmatched capabilities. And what better way to encourage innovation in this sector than giving it this approach?

Here are a few focus areas of this laboratory:

  • Optimising energy grid by using quantum power to identify how to balance energy supply and demand in real time
  • Improve drug discovery through fast analysis of molecular structures
  • Improve climate prediction
  • Supercharging artificial intelligence applications in areas like fraud detection

Challenges amidst potential benefits

At this point, you can actually agree that quantum AI can really work wonders for the UK economy. In fact, if we were to consider AI alone, some experts claim that it could add up to £550 billion to the country’s GDP over the next few years. But as we already highlighted, the infrastructure surrounding this technology sometimes gets limited, especially when its application scales.

Besides, businesses need to become more acquainted with these technologies, which can actually be some good work. Plus, developing hardware capable of processing the needs of QAI is not a walk in the park. In fact, some experts think that this might have to wait until 2030 before it becomes possible.

Don’t forget that according to a recent report, the UK accounted for just about 1% of the world’s computing capacity. To stay ahead in this revolution, the country will need significant resources like expanding data centers. Plus, there are not so many people with the expertise required for this technology. In fact, studies show that about 40% of organisations often have a hard time finding staff with adequate digital skills. So, as the demand for QAI continues to grow, businesses will need to invest a lot of resources in training and reskilling to stay ahead.

If the country manages to shift completely to QAI as it anticipates, a lot will really change. Things like drug discovery and fraud detection will become more effective, given this technology’s unusual computational ability. 

Guest Article.

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