17 June 2021

BMW supports new TUM endowed chair with 5.1 million euros

Industrial application of quantum computers

The BMW Group will support future research on quantum computers at the Technical University of Munich (TUM). The contract establishing the endowed chair for Quantum Algorithms and Applications ("Quantenalgorithmen und -anwendungen") was signed by TUM president Thomas F. Hofmann, BMW AG Board of Management member Frank Weber and BMW AG CIO Alexander Buresch.

he BMW Group will provide 5.1 million euros over the course of six years for the professorship, infrastructure and employees at TUM. The BMW Group and TUM are bridging the gap between excellent fundamental research in Germany and industrial applications. The chair will conduct application-oriented research into specific issues and open questions in the field of quantum computing and will establish a constant exchange of knowledge and findings between TUM and the BMW Group.

Generous investment in research

TUM President Hofmann thanked BMW for the generous research investment: "This BMW-TUM partnership will strengthen the Munich Quantum Valley as Germany's leading eco-system for quantum technologies. Quantum computing has the future potential to solve complex tasks in ways which would be unthinkable even with today's supercomputers. The new endowed chair will develop quantum algorithms and test application fields for this purpose. The generous support of the BMW Group will generate the leverage effect needed to transfer findings in the field of quantum physics to industrial applications."

BMW Board of Management member Weber stated: "The BMW Group is convinced that quantum computing is a ground-breaking future technology and that it has considerable potential for a large number of application areas, for example in materials research such as battery cell chemistry, and for the future of automated driving with quantum machine learning. However, the technology is still in the early stages of maturity. It is therefore particularly important to us to support cutting-edge research and its transfer to industrial application now in the best way possible."

Long-term partnership

TUM and the BMW Group have already formed a close partnership in many other topic areas, most notably battery research, Circular Economy, automated driving and artificial intelligence in manufacturing, as well as mobility research. The BMW Group supports practically oriented teaching through a variety of guest lectures and project work. In addition, BMW works together closely with the TUM Institute for Lifelong Learning.

Source: TUM Website

Contact

Ulrich Meyer
TUM Corporate Communications Center
presse[at]tum.de