Quantum computing is one of the novel computing paradigms gaining credibility in various sectors like finance, computer science, etc. The advent of the compute and forward paradigm in telecommunication networks was due to the softwarization of network functionalities, which have become an integral part of next-generation (5G and beyond) communication networks. Hence, communication networks are moving towards programmable network elements along with their respective functionalities running on general-purpose rather than special-purpose hardware.

5G and beyond networks will enable novel applications that require high data rate (1 ~ 100 Gbps), low latency (0.1~1 ms), and significant energy efficiency. Existing cloud computing data centers are not sufficient to provide these requirements for end users. Conventionally, computing in a communication network is done in ASIC, FPGA, and CPU/GPUs. However, the computing performance of these devices is not improving at the rate needed for realizing 5G and beyond applications.

Hence, alternative approaches like quantum computing could come to enable the stringent performance requirements of computing, needed for 5G and beyond networks. Quantum computing works on two fundamental principles: superposition and entanglement. Due to these properties, quantum computing can offer speedups to non-quantum algorithms, and also compute complex data faster. Henceforth, it would be necessary to investigate the role of quantum computing in future communication networks.

The goals of the internship follow:

1. Acquiring knowledge on quantum computing platforms with the different physical properties.
2. Evaluation of performance and trade-offs for using quantum computing in communication technology.
3. Design of quantum-assisted computing process in a hybrid classical-quantum network data centre.