The race to shape the future of computing is heating up among tech companies, with Microsoft saying it's made a major breakthrough in quantum computing, potentially paving the way for the technology to address complex scientific and societal challenges.

Microsoft on Wednesday unveiled a new chip that it said showed quantum computing is "years, not decades" away, joining Google and IBM in predicting that a fundamental change in computing technology is much closer than recently believed.

Tech giant Microsoft unveiled a new computer chip on Wednesday that it says could transform everything from fighting pollution to developing new medicines, joining Google and IBM in arguing that the promise of quantum computing is closer to reality.