[alphager]

Absolutely true in the real world; I was part of a real team that explored quantum optimization algorithms as part of a strategic initiative (my day job is algorithmic optimization on classical computers).

Our problem is similar (but not identical) to the traveling salesman problem. We run on a tight time constraint (measured in days for the complex type and measured in minutes for the simple type).

We're running approximations on classic computers but estimate that we'd save billions if we could reach optimum.

[rightbyte]

> We're running approximations on classic computers but estimate that we'd save billions if we could reach optimum.

Wont some Monte Carlo sim get you quite close?

[alphager]

We are as close as you can get, but we estimate that we're about 3.5% away from true optimum on the hardest problem we try to optimize.