Google has announced its latest quantum computing chip, 'Willow.' The company claimed that the processor performed a standard benchmark computation in under five minutes, which would otherwise take 10 25 years on a conventional supercomputer.

Google's breakthrough in speed and error correction with its new quantum chip, while not immediately useful for most businesses, accelerates the timeline for quantum-safe security preparation and signals a critical moment for technology leaders to begin strategic planning for the quantum era.

Quantum chips like Willow operate on a much smaller scale. The qubits that make up these high powered chips are roughly the size of an atom, and operate via the rules of quantum mechanics. The chips pack a computing punch at a miniscule level and with potentially better energy efficiency than supercomputers, but they’re also limited in their uses.