In 2021, the BMW Group, in collaboration with Amazon Web Services (AWS), launched the BMW Group Quantum Computing Challenge, a global open innovation initiative focused on discovering potential quantum computing solutions for real-world automotive industry use cases . Amazon Web Services This partnership represented one of the first major quantum computing innovation challenges focused entirely on industrial automotive applications, demonstrating both companies’ commitment to exploring the potential of quantum technologies in transforming automotive design, manufacturing, and operations.

The Automotive Industry Challenge

The automotive industry faces numerous complex computational challenges that have historically been difficult or impossible to solve with classical computing methods. These include optimizing pre-production vehicle configuration, accurately simulating material deformation in manufacturing processes, determining optimal sensor placement in vehicles, and improving machine learning for automated quality assessment.

These challenges are characterized by their combinatorial complexity and the need to consider numerous variables and constraints simultaneously. For example, pre-production vehicle testing requires managing complex dependencies between different test requirements while minimizing the number of vehicles built. Similarly, material deformation simulation involves solving complex non-linear partial differential equations that are computationally intensive.

The automotive industry’s increasing focus on sustainability, efficiency, and autonomous capabilities has further heightened the need for computational approaches that can address these complex problems more effectively than traditional methods.

Quantum Solution

Rather than implementing a single quantum solution, BMW and AWS took an innovative approach by creating a global challenge to identify multiple potential quantum applications across different aspects of automotive operations. The challenge focused on four specific use cases:

Pre-production Vehicle Configuration: Optimizing the testing process to perform the maximum number of required tests on a minimum number of vehicles while accounting for buildability and scheduling constraints.
Material Deformation Simulation: Developing quantum algorithmic approaches to model and numerically simulate material deformation for predicting material properties in the pre-production phase of vehicle component manufacturing.
Vehicle Sensor Placement: Optimizing the positions of sensors to maximize coverage while minimizing the total number of required sensors, critical for safety and convenience in modern vehicles.
Machine Learning for Automated Quality Assessment: Using quantum machine learning techniques to improve the assessment of vehicle parts for defects such as cracks and scratches caused by the metal-forming process.

To support the challenge participants, AWS provided access to Amazon Braket, its fully managed quantum computing service. This gave teams access to quantum hardware from multiple providers including D-Wave, IonQ, and Rigetti, as well as quantum circuit simulators . Amazon Web Services AWS also offered credits for participants to use these services, removing financial barriers to experimentation with quantum approaches.

Implementation

The BMW-AWS Quantum Computing Challenge was organized into two rounds. In the first round, participants submitted detailed concept proposals for one or more of the four use cases. Teams with the top submissions in each use case advanced to the second round, where they were tasked with implementing and demonstrating their solutions.

The implementation phase involved teams from around the world working with the Amazon Quantum Solutions Lab Professional Services team and BMW Group experts to refine their approaches and test them on real automotive industry data. The AWS team provided technical support and guidance on using quantum computing resources effectively.

Throughout the challenge, BMW and AWS emphasized the importance of practical solutions that could potentially be implemented in real-world automotive applications, even as quantum hardware continues to mature. This meant that many of the approaches were hybrid quantum-classical solutions that could deliver value in the near term while positioning BMW to take advantage of quantum computing advancements in the future.

Results and Business Impact

The challenge produced innovative solutions across all four use cases, with winning teams announced at the Q2B quantum computing industry conference in December 2021. The winning solutions included a range of different approaches and ideas.

For pre-production vehicle configuration, a team from Technical University of Munich and BMW Group IT developed a solution using quantum annealing that outperformed the classical state-of-the-art in certain scenarios. The material deformation simulation challenge was won by quantum computing startup Qu&Co, which provided a detailed, NISQ-ready solution strategy based on differentiable quantum circuits with promising benchmark comparisons to exact results.

Accenture’s team won the sensor placement challenge with a holistic workflow from user input to final result, including a framework with plugins for future quantum methods. For machine learning quality assessment, a team from Leibniz Supercomputing Centre developed a hybrid quantum-classical machine learning approach that demonstrated superior performance for small datasets.

Dr. Peter Lehnert, Vice President BMW Group Research and New Technologies Digital Car, emphasized the significance of these results, stating that “future technologies such as quantum computing have the potential to make our products more desirable and sustainable”.

The business impact extended beyond the specific solutions developed during the challenge. The initiative established BMW as a leader in exploring quantum computing applications in the automotive industry, built relationships with key quantum computing experts and institutions, and created a foundation for ongoing quantum computing innovation within BMW’s operations.

Future Directions

Building on the success of the initial challenge, BMW and AWS have continued their quantum computing collaboration. In 2023, BMW hosted the “Quantum Computing for Automotive Challenges” event, which brought together experts to discuss further applications and advancements in quantum technologies for the automotive sector . Amazon Web Services

More recently, BMW joined forces with Airbus and AWS to launch the “Airbus-BMW Group Quantum Mobility Quest” in 2024, expanding the scope to include aviation applications and offering larger prizes to encourage even more innovative quantum computing solutions . Amazon Web Services

The ongoing partnership between BMW and AWS aims to bridge the gap between scientific exploration and practical industrial applications of quantum computing. As quantum hardware continues to advance, BMW is positioning itself to quickly adopt these technologies to address its most challenging computational problems, potentially leading to more efficient operations, improved vehicle designs, and more sustainable manufacturing processes.