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I run a small industrial applied research lab (<100 researchers). The truth is that, except in fairly specific cases, we don't need PhD level staff either. Just
by bane 10y ago
I run a small industrial applied research lab (<100 researchers). The truth is that, except in fairly specific cases, we don't need PhD level staff either. Just like in a university lab, the bulk of the hard work is done by people with Graduate (or in some cases Undergraduate) degrees. Practical experience in the field is also about 50% of what we need (since we're ultimately figuring out things that can go into engineering and deployed operationally, knowing what the end-state environment looks and runs like is critical). The role of PI is more often filled in our case by the corporate leadership.
I honestly think that the lack of large industrial research labs and the drying up of good academic research positions is very much an issue of what would be R&D funding going to other things that provide better near term ROI: VC, stock market, etc.
R&D is very much an investment like anything else and for whatever reason (patents, existing IP portfolios, etc.), it's just not a place that gets much attention at the moment as the money handlers have found that they have more ROI opportunity elsewhere.
I think the modern substitute for old fashioned R&D is the modern tech startup. The siren call of these ridiculously inflated "valuations" is simply too much for investment managers and it locks up more and more money that could go towards other investments. There's more parallels there as well, R&D and Startup investment is a high-failure game. But the outcome of successful startups is likely to be much larger than the outcome of a successful R&D venture (which still has very long tails of IP capture, product development, marketing, etc.)
I think it's a shame in the sense that, while we end up with dozens of photo sharing sites and social network startups, there's very few actual world changing ones out there. Most of what we get are not "hard" technical areas and their value derives from their faddish popularity - they're kind of the Karashians of technology.
But I guess that's the way of the world.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- selectron 10y agoThe goal of research (at least for basic science) isn't to make money, it is to increase knowledge about the universe. This knowledge is a public good, so it makes sense that private industries motivated by profit do not support fundamental research. Scientific progress is a rising tide that lifts all boats.
- bane 10y agoAt some point most of the sources of funding for most research, there's some expectation of ROI at some point. This isn't true obviously for very basic research, but even then there's a hope that the process of exploring the deep unknown produces some practical output. For example, the process of building and designing the LHC produced various advances in fields as far ranging as management theory to precision machining and CAD design. For the organizations and countries involved, this helps provide for an advanced industrial base that continues to build and drive an ecosystem that supports powerful economic engines.
- selectron 10y agoIf you just want ROI, you are better off spending your money elsewhere. This is evidenced by the lack of money most companies put into scientific research. Further the gains of science are in general hard to profit off of. (http://www.therichest.com/business/they-could-have-been-billionaires/ http://www.therichest.com/business/they-could-have-been-bill...) Another major reason governments fund research is to produce people with PhDs. This is why the apprenticeship structure of academia is so sticky, and why in order to get tenure professors have to graduate students.
- danielweber 10y agoPrice signals are how we tell people what research careers are worth considering. Unless they don't mind working for peanuts, in which case there's no problem.
- tostitos1979 10y agoWell .. it is a tournament model so price is misleading. Top researchers at industrial labs get paid a decent amount. The problem is (a) getting a coveted job, and (b) mobility when things eventually go south at your employer and they decide research is expendable.
- projectramo 10y ago
- fdgh 10y agoI think the modern substitute for old fashioned R&D is the modern tech startup. The siren call of these ridiculously inflated "valuations" is simply too much for investment managers and it locks up more and more money that could go towards other investments. There's more parallels there as well, R&D and Startup investment is a high-failure game. But the outcome of successful startups is likely to be much larger than the outcome of a successful R&D venture (which still has very long tails of IP capture, product development, marketing, etc.) That's how it's marketed... but instead of having a research advisor in the old (admittedly, creaky) guild culture, you manage up into investors... many of whom (obviously, not all) are MBA man-children. Then again, if academics had the capacity to manage their own affairs, they wouldn't have lost their culture and ended up in this situation to begin with. This is a self-caused calamity. Unfortunately, the people who fucked it up still have tenure and it's the rising generation that gets screwed.