New grounds for boosting pharmaceutical R&D with quantum computing

“Quantum computing could accelerate pharmaceutical R&D by better simulating and predicting the biological and clinical phenomena linked to human health.”Sébastien Tourlet, Director, Intelligent Industry and Life Sciences, Capgemini Invent

We stand at the brink of profound breakthrough in quantum computing, one in which the number of calculations per second is exponentially increased. This increased computation opens new doors for all industries, but especially for pharmaceuticals. Built on principles of quantum mechanics, these next-gen computers leverage different types of algorithms to perform quantum optimization, simulation, and machine learning. This will be a revolution in pharmaceutical R&D, facilitating the modeling of complex chemical and biological phenomena, from molecular structures to patient medical history.

At Capgemini, we believe quantum computing will be used to increase the success rates of clinical trials. Greater processing power will lead to advanced modelling of diseases and the effects of treatments at gene, cell, tissue, organ, patient, and population level. As a result, we will all soon live in a world with more optimal trials with reduced patient cohorts. Moreover, the lengthy and complicated trial process can be reduced, enabling us to react even more swiftly to future health crises and make new progress in treatments for existing diseases.