Service overview
About NEDO's project
The project, "Research and Development of Innovative Annealing Machines for Combinatorial Optimization Processing," was commissioned by NEDO's "Development of AI Chip and Next-Generation Computing Technologies for High-Efficiency and High-Speed Processing/Research and Development Item 3: Development of Cross-Sectoral Technologies for Realizing an Advanced IoT Society. In the project, "Research and Development of Innovative Annealing Machines for Combinatorial Optimization Processing," a project commissioned by "R&D Item 3: Cross-Sectoral Technology Development for Realizing an Advanced IoT Society," Hitachi, Ltd. was in charge of the research and development of a large-scale CMOS annealing machine that can process combinatorial optimization problems, which will become increasingly important in the IoT (Internet of Things) society, with more than 1,000 times higher energy efficiency than conventional annealing machines (Ising model-type devices).
This project is a part of the project "Development of AI chip and next generation computing technology for high efficiency and high speed processing / Development of next generation computing technology / Comprehensive research and development of quantum computation and Ising computation system". We will continue our research and development activities and promote further dissemination of research results.
The annealing machine is a computer that can handle complex optimization calculations, which are beyond the capabilities of conventional computers, using a revolutionary method. The realization of annealing machines on a practical level will greatly advance the IoT society and contribute to the achievement of the SDG's.
Purpose of Annealing Cloud Web
Annealing Cloud Web was established in 2018 as a cloud service to disseminate the results of the aforementioned NEDO project.
This cloud service is open to the public free of charge with the aim of allowing a wide range of people to actually experience the CMOS annealing machine. Through this service, we aim to (1) expand the user base of the annealing machine, (2) accelerate the development of related peripheral technologies such as software, and (3) further improve the performance of the annealing machine.
In particular, to expand the user base, we hope that the use of this cloud service will lead to the formation of a user community and strong collaboration among users. In addition, by actually using this cloud service and experiencing how to incorporate it into software, we aim to promote software development and train software engineers for annealing machines.
Currently, experiments are underway to apply annealing machines to such applications as traffic jam reduction, automatic picking in logistics warehouses, and financial engineering. In order to solve problems by applying annealing machines in reality, it is necessary for many people to use them. For this reason, with this cloud service, we would like as many people as possible to feel the fun of running an annealing machine and to become interested in it.
We see more and more terms like annealing machine and quantum computer, but trying to understand the computational principles and apply them to the problems around us may seem like a high hurdle for non-specialists because it requires some complicated mathematical considerations.
In this cloud service, we have tried to provide more easy-to-understand explanations with the aim of lowering the knowledge hurdle for interested visitors. In addition, once the prerequisite knowledge is fully understood, the next step is to use the Web Once you have a good understanding of the prerequisite knowledge, you can immediately start experimenting and practicing using the Web API and Ising editor. So, let's open the door of optimization process with Annealing Cloud Web.