Because sometimes when you put a bunch of smart people in one place and let them fuck around with whatever they think is interesting with no regards to obvious, immediate applications, interesting things happen. Some of these interesting things turn into ways to make a shit-ton of money.
Wikipedia's article on Bell Labs has a long list of stuff that came out of it. Some of it's stuff they made money off of, some is stuff other people made money off of. Some of it's stuff other people made money off of that ended up also creating a lot of traffic on Bell's networks.
Every major multinational corporation would disagree with that statement. They care to the extent that their products and profit margins depend on science which is to say: applied science as engineering is precisely what is being sold by them. The vent on your bag of coffee beans flown across the world ona jet, the graphite in your hydraulic brakes on your Tesla automobile or Prius, the computer you’re using that was the result of decades of different companies’ research and development… manufactured goods of any kind are the direct result of scientific advancement, and those companies know it, fund it, and hire from top universities to continue it. They all have R&D. Even Exxon funded research into global warming (tho they did silence the researchers when it turned out their main product was detrimental to all mammals on the planet).
Wikipedia's article on Bell Labs has a long list of stuff that came out of it. Some of it's stuff they made money off of, some is stuff other people made money off of. Some of it's stuff other people made money off of that ended up also creating a lot of traffic on Bell's networks.