01 | Dead and Alive: Battle for quantum supremacy

Google announces it has achieved something game changing — quantum supremacy. But not everybody agrees.

The company claims its quantum computer called Sycamore has solved a problem that no classical computer could manage in hundreds of thousands of years. 

IBM wants this stricken from history.

A war of words breaks out as two tech giants race to build a useful quantum computer that could change how the world works.

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Guests:

Scott YoungCropping and livestock farmer in Ballan, Victoria

Gideon LichfieldJournalist, former editor-in-chief of WIRED and MIT Technology Review

Professor John Martinis2025 Nobel laureate in Physics

Credits:

• Presenter: Jacinta Bowler
• Producer: Fiona Pepper
• Senior Producer: Shelby Traynor
• Executive Producer: Petria Ladgrove
• Sound Engineer: Tim Jenkins
• Archives Research: Lisa Chidlow, Michael Osmond

This story was made on the lands of the Wurundjeri, Gadigal and Menang Noongar peoples.

More information

Quantum supremacy using a programmable superconducting processor

On “quantum supremacy” - IBM