BASF, Multiverse reveal foreign exchange trading project
Two of the busiest companies in quantum lately just announced they are working together on a project. To be clear, German chemical giant BASF and Spain’s Multiverse Computing have been working on the project since January, and it is scheduled to last for nine months, so it is very near completion, but the two companies did not reveal those details until Tuesday morning.
The focus of the project is on development of models for foreign exchange (forex) trading optimization, and currently focused only on trading between Euros and U.S. dollars. The effort began in January 2022 and was scheduled to last for nine months, with a final technical paper to be issued near the end of the project, so it sounds like there will be another update from the companies in the coming weeks or perhaps by October.
“BASF is a company which has been working to adopt quantum-based solutions for some time. In many ways they are a pioneer in this space, on top of being a world-class business,” said Enrique Lizaso Olmos, CEO of Multiverse Computing. “This makes today’s news even more gratifying because we have been selected by a corporation which has an in-depth knowledge of the quantum computing industry. We view this as a validation of our work up to this point.”
“Quantum computing is a promising field which has developed rapidly over recent years. Multiverse has a strong focus and expertise in quantum computing in the financial industry, and BASF wanted to start a joint project to explore what we can do together,” said Dr. Abhishek Awasthi, member of the Next Generation Computing team at BASF and working with Multiverse on this project. “In our conversations with Multiverse, we believe they can offer a significant advantage in terms of optimization of forex transactions.”
News of the pairing comes barely a month after BASF partnered with Pasqal on a project related to weather modeling and other potential applications. The German conglomerate has dabbled in quantum computing before, including through a 2019 investment in Zapata Computing, but it seems like the company is ramping up its interest and involvement in the sector.
This week’s announcement also arrives as Multiverse has been busy in recent weeks partnering with the likes of IQM and Bosch. The BASF and Bosch partnerships are both good news for quantum sector watchers who are anxiously waiting for large corporate enterprises to start getting more focused about their potential quantum computing use cases.
Dan O’Shea has covered telecommunications and related topics including semiconductors, sensors, retail systems, digital payments and quantum computing/technology for over 25 years.
