r&d

The 23rd IRI R&D Trends Forecast, based on survey data from 99 of the 200 IRI member organizations that conduct R&D in the U.S., shows that member firms with U.S. research facilities anticipate a significant increase in overall spending and a strong focus on new business development. R&D leaders will continue to be pushed to grow the business through innovation at an increasing pace. Members expect to continue to accelerate their open innovation through collaboration on R&D with each other, universities and federal laboratories.

According to this BEA/NEA report, investment in research and development accounted for 4.5 percent of the growth of inflation-adjusted U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) between 1959 and 2002.

This paper investigates the relationship between the location of private sector R&D labs and university research departments in Great Britain. This relationship is stronger for foreign-owned labs, consistent with multinationals sourcing technology internationally. We also find some evidence for co-location with lower rated research departments in industries such as machinery and communications equipment.

This paper investigates how the entry mode of foreign direct investment affects the affiliate R&D activities using unique data on Swedish multinational firms over a long period of time (1970 to 1998). On average, acquired affiliates are more likely to do R&D and have a higher level of R&D intensity than affiliates created by greenfield entry.

This paper examines the dynamics of fundamental research by creating a model in which research allocate their efforts between improving existing fields and inventing new ones. The authors conclude that the research fields experience phases of alternating innovation and exploitation, and at other times experience constant invention until settling into semi-permanent exploitation.

This paper shows that higher uncertainty reduces the responsiveness of R&D to changes in business conditions, making it more persistent over time. Thus, uncertainty plays a critical role in shaping the dynamics of R&D through the business cycle, and its response to technology policy. The authors also show that if firms are increasing their level of R&D then the effect of uncertainty will be negative, while if firms are reducing R&D then the effect of uncertainty will be positive.

The authors report evidence indicating that Bitnet adoption facilitated increased research collaboration between US universities. However, not all institutions benefited equally. Using panel data from seven top engineering journals, Bitnet connection records, and a variety of institution ranking data, they find that medium-ranked universities were the primary beneficiaries; they benefited largely by increasing their collaboration with top-ranked schools. Furthermore, the authors find that the magnitude of this effect was greatest for co-located pairs.

This report compiles data about the top 1250 global companies as measured by R&D investment. Within the five largest sectors, the pharmaceutical and software industries continue to enjoy a steady increase, gaining on technology hardware in the top spot.

The authors conduct five case studies to look into the extent and types of crossdisciplinary practices in a specialty of bionanotechnology. They found that there is a consistently high degree of cross-disciplinarity in the cognitive aspects of research (i.e. references and instrumentalities), but a more erratic and narrower degree associated with social constructs.

The authors develop a model of the location of global R&D investments by multinational firms, where research investments increase the number of varieties of goods sold globally by the firm, and development activities reduce the cost of producing existing varieties in specific countries. Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) protection in a country enhances the efficiency of the firms local research as well as the profitability local development efforts. The authors test predictions of the model on survey data on foreign and domestic R&D for Japanese multinational firms.