Microsoft’s Majorana 2 quantum chip highlights agentic AI in R&D

Microsoft says its Majorana 2 quantum chip shows major gains in reliability and qubit lifetime, alongside a revised plan to reach a commercially scalable quantum computer by 2029. The company said the chip was developed with support from Microsoft Discovery, its agentic AI platform for scientific research and development, which also became generally available this week. Microsoft presents the project as an example of how AI tools can help researchers manage large datasets, automate measurements, and identify patterns across longrunning experiments. According to Microsoft, the most important hardware improvement came from a materials change from aluminium to lead, while the AI system helped with surrounding research tasks such as workflow management and measurement automation. The company said earlier attempts to automate some of these steps with older machine learning methods had not worked as well. Microsoft also said Discovery is now available to enterprise customers, with a free local app in early preview. The company noted that its new quantum timeline is based on Majorana 2’s progress, while broader comparisons with other quantum approaches remain difficult because the architectures differ.