D-Wave Quantum Inc. (NYSE: QBTS) is one of the leaders among a pool of smaller quantum computing companies competing against legacy tech giants like Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) and Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG). The quantum computing industry seeks to utilize quantum mechanics to develop computers capable of outperforming even the best supercomputers by many orders of magnitude. The incentive to develop this technology is incredibly powerful, as evidenced by multiple announcements from major tech firms of critical benchmarks in quantum computing chip design just this year.
Smaller players like D-Wave face an uphill battle when competing against Microsoft and their ilk on the research and development front, given the massive disparity in funds these companies have available to put toward chip design and testing. So it was all the more impressive when, on March 12, D-Wave announced that it had achieved a breakthrough demonstration of quantum supremacy—and it claimed to be the first and only example of this feat to take place so far.
