According to reports, the UK Ministry of Defence has invested its efforts in the purchase of quantum computers to revolutionize its existing technology and has recently signed a contract with the quantum computing start-up Orca. However, the main purpose of getting hands-on with this sophisticated technology is to bring the concept of “making its tanks smarter” into practicality. The agreement was declared this week by Richard Murray, the CEO of Orca. He said that their products have become the focus of interest because of their unique and reliable characteristics.
According to him, “It lends itself to all of those types of things, and it’s more durable.” I mean, maybe one day, a fighter jet. I think we’re focusing mostly on just maybe a larger-scale platform that can live on the ground.” He further added that the product lines of the company are diverse and some of them have the engraved capability of “fitting on a regular computer shelf”. Moreover, they can also function at normal room temperatures instead of requiring adjustable conditions.
We don’t know the purpose behind acquiring this technology, but the UK military might be working on enhancing its responsiveness on the battlefield through the use of these quantum computers, and that could be a good guess. However, these computers are recognized for solving complex mathematical problems in a matter of seconds, and that might be the reason behind this latest procurement to make their programming structure more advanced.
“This device we’re shipping to them certainly won’t do anything a classical computer won’t, and I suppose, in that view, it’s a research tool. There’s a lot of activity being funded at the moment,” stated Murray in an interview. Coupled with this, a spokesperson from this start-up, Orca, made it more clear by explaining that through the use of this technology, military personnel can enhance their “communication on the battlefield” with the adoption of “image recognition and sensor management” technology.
He further said, “This technology will make information processing for command decisions on the battlefield more agile and reduce risks from data sharing with an undeployable processor located off the battlefield.” However, the technology is still not deployed and is in the formulation phase. Scientists have to see now how they can make the tanks of the UK military smarter by efficiently incorporating the technology. There is still a long way to go, but the roads are all clear.