Vallance: UK must turn quantum leadership into economic impact

'We need to ensure that quantum companies not only start here, but scale here and stay here’

A phrase heard repeatedly at The Economist’s Commercialising Quantum Global event in London was “not if, but when”. A couple of speakers joked that quantum computing is in a race with another so‑called “never-never” technology: nuclear fusion. If their respective proponents are correct, both could cross the finish line at around the same time, before 2030.

Voices from both camps are sounding increasingly confident, and both are attracting more investment. Of course, those two trends may be connected.

For quantum computing, the goal is to produce a valid, fault-tolerant computer with hundreds or thousands of stable qubits - enough to support general applications without operators having to worry about decoherence and collapse. For fusion, the aim is to reliably generate more energy than is put in.

Lord Vallance, Minister for Science, Innovation and Technology, spoke of the UK’s leadership in quantum sensing, timing, imaging, communications and networking, citing sustained government funding and support over the past 12 years. This includes the creation of the National Quantum Computing Centre and Edinburgh’s Quantum Software Lab.

The challenge facing the country now, he said, is how to scale these early efforts. “We need to turn scientific strength into sustained economic impact and, indeed, to national advantage.”

Innovation will be led by the private sector, but the government will play a major role in supporting these efforts - working with industry and providing incentives to “ensure that quantum companies not only start here, but scale here and stay here,” Vallance said.

Part of this effort is the government’s ProQure programme, announced in March, a funding competition that will see the UK government act as an early customer for promising developments in areas such as healthcare. A more recent announcement was a £12 million fund to support hybrid quantum computing algorithms. A £33 million fund to support the development of UK quantum supply chains is due later this summer, and £30 million of support for quantum software is also in the pipeline.

“This isn’t just about hardware; it’s about software solutions, error correction, industrial readiness of the entire system and - often forgotten - data readiness,” Vallance explained.

And it is not just about computing, either. Vallance pointed to additional funding for research into quantum sensing, networking and positioning, as well as the launch of a Quantum Growth Alliance. This brings together 10 major companies, including HSBC, BP, Vodafone and Rolls-Royce, in a forum designed to define promising use cases and accelerate the path from innovation to adoption.

As for whether a fault-tolerant quantum computer or viable nuclear fusion arrives first, Vallance said he’d be happy with either outcome. “I don’t mind if you’re in a race with fusion, as long as you both get on with it quickly.”