In a discussion with analysts and media members following his keynote address at GTC 2024 (a leading conference on artificial intelligence), Nvidia (NVDA -0.32%) CEO Jensen Huang outlined a list of top technologies his company is at the forefront of developing: industrial robotics, 6G (move over, 5G), weather prediction, particle physics analysis, biology, and so on.
Among those massive developments Huang mentioned was quantum computing.
In fact, as researchers and developers race to make a breakthrough, Nvidia stock might be the best bet on quantum computers right now. Here's what you need to know.
It's not just about the hardware
Many investors are looking to invest in a company developing a quantum computer. That makes sense. Before software and services can be developed, hardware itself is where it all begins.
There is incredible promise in quantum computing, which uses "superposition" in quantum mechanics to store and compute exponentially more information than classical computers, including Nvidia's accelerated compute systems powered by its leading GPU chips.
A company that could solve the many challenges with developing an intricate system that taps the power of quantum mechanics could make a great deal of money. Only a few publicly traded start-ups are available, including IonQ, but all of these companies are still in research and development (R&D) mode. Nvidia is in on this game, but it has taken a hybrid approach.
In March 2023, Nvidia announced -- in conjunction with privately held start-up Quantum Machines -- a GPU-accelerated quantum computing control unit that orchestrates the operations of a quantum computer. I wrote about it here about a year ago.
At the GTC event, Huang said:
We should be a great partner for the quantum computing industry. How else are you going to drive a quantum computer? To have the world's fastest computer sitting next to it? And how are you going to simulate a quantum computer, emulate a quantum computer? What is the programming model for a quantum computer? You can't just program a quantum computer all by itself. You need to have classical computing sitting next to it. And so the quantum would be kind of a quantum accelerator. ... Who should go do that? Well, we've done that.
Nvidia, the world's largest researcher?
What Huang is saying is that Nvidia is already at the heart of the quantum industry.
These complex new quantum computing systems aren't just going to be invented out of thin air. Nvidia's acceleration platform is even now powering the R&D work on the hardware itself, helping simulate the design of new types of "chips" for quantum computing.
The work doesn't stop there. Nvidia is also helping to accelerate the coding of the new software that will run on a quantum computer, since superposition that encodes that exponential leap in information can't simply operate on the classical ones and zeroes that our computers today use. And even once quantum computers begin to go into more widespread use, they will need a classical computer interface so that the massive amount of data being cranked out is usable to users of classical computers.
All of this is where Nvidia comes in. Much like it has done with its AI systems, it has an ecosystem of hardware (like the aforementioned one with Quantum Machines) and a library of software algorithms sitting atop the hardware, powering the quantum computing industry R&D efforts.
To be clear, Nvidia itself is not involved in developing a quantum computer -- at least, not that it has publicly disclosed. Instead, it is using its computing acceleration prowess using AI and a library of development software to help researchers and start-ups around the globe bring useful quantum computers to market. In conversations with Nvidia and others in the industry, widespread commercialization (not R&D spending) is likely still at least a few years away, if not more.
Until then, add quantum computing R&D spending -- which no doubt gets filed under Nvidia's large and fast-growing "data center" revenue segment -- to the list of reasons Nvidia stock is worth holding for the long term.
