> Big companies add huge value to all our wellbeing. 1000 companies with a revenue of ten million dollars can afford to spend little to nothing on research, whi

> Big companies add huge value to all our wellbeing. 1000 companies with a revenue of ten million dollars can afford to spend little to nothing on research, while one company with a revenue of ten billion dollars can spend a lot. There's a lot of space between companies with 10 million dollars in revenue and ones with 10-100 billion where lots of R&D can happen. Smaller companies can be very good at new product development, and are probably better at supporting those products once they catch on and become established. The really far-out R&D is probably better handled by university research labs than by big-company monopolies and semi-monopolies, which then will spin off small product development companies. > How many startups comes up with new medicines, for example? Seems like quite a lot, actually: https://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20180509/BLOGS11/180509844/northwestern-launches-biomedical-startup-accelerator-newcures https://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20180509/BLOGS11/180... http://fortune.com/2016/05/13/big-pharma-biotech-startups/ http://fortune.com/2016/05/13/big-pharma-biotech-startups/: > A crucial part of the allure: Pint-size ventures are driving pharma innovation. The majority of drugs approved in recent years originated at smaller ­outfits—64% of them last year, according to HBM Partners, a health care investing firm.