[marcinzm]

Most large companies have research divisions that do a variety of tasks which are not directly tied to short term money. The work varies from almost-pure to almost-applied but generally has different KPIs than product teams (patents for example). They're usually run closer to an academic institution in terms of structure and management. Granted there's generally some incentive to get other teams in the company to actually implement whatever you came up with.

[n0on3]

That's true, but I think on one hand these are fairly rare cases compared to the whole industry while on the other there is also the point that these divisions might not be as stable and long-lasting as one might expect.

Related, discussed on HN a while ago: https://blog.dshr.org/2020/05/the-death-of-corporate-researc... Previous discussions https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24200764 and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23246672

[marcinzm]

To the first point, they're rare but industry is massive so their total absolute size isn't that small. And if you're a tenured professor in a semi-related area then it's not hard to land in one of them.

To the second point, it's true that the research focuses shift over time but if your research area fizzles out you can either shift to a more applied position or move back to academia.