[acomjean]

I mean these companies have Research and Development divisions. I was at IBM at the turn of the century when they spent 6 billion dollars on research. One of the pushes was to get research to focus on things they could market and make money with.

But the big research plays (bell labs, xerox parc) seem to get less and less funding if they exist at all. A lot of the inventions of those places were monitized outside those companies. IBM had a chip fab in the research building… long spun of was that business.

At the turn of the century IBM was researching quantum computing, but as I was leaving selling services was IBMs big push.

[ptero]

It is not the amount of funding, it is the allocation that doomed R&D at big companies.

Forty years ago they were the best game in town for applied research (defining applied as, on success, having a fast track to commercialization). Later it became similar to the university research: on success, you write some articles, get company wows, but business people have no idea where to stick it and half heartedly throw a few applications at it to see if any stick. Most don't (e.g., deep blue, watson).

At this point large company R&D centers got passed over (by a lot) by VC- funded applied research and saw a (IMO well deserved) drop of funding.

[chrisweekly]

+1 Insightful.

Also, in the spirit of helpfulness, "passed over" is the wrong turn of phrase as used here; it implies "declined or rejected" (as in, being passed over for a promotion at work). I think "surpassed" or "leap-frogged" are closer to your intended meaning. HTH! :)

[ptero]

Agreed, thank you! I appreciate corrections for my non-native english speakerness :)