National Business Wire (Dec 15) -- U.S. tech giant IBM announced Thursday that it will collaborate with five top universities in Japan, the U.S. and South Korea on preparing future quantum workforce.

The five universities are the University of Tokyo and Keio University in Japan, Yonsei University and Seoul National University in South Korea, and the University of Chicago in the United States.

IBM intends to deliver educational offerings, work with the five universities in the field of quantum computing to train up to 40,000 students over the next decade.

The partnership "is a crucial step toward exploring useful quantum applications," said Darío Gil, Senior Vice President and Director of IBM Research.