3 ms·
I am not an expert, but it's my understanding that what is R&D vs. "only" engineering is largely an accounting question. I don't think Microsoft is spending all
by twoodfin 13y ago
I am not an expert, but it's my understanding that what is R&D vs. "only" engineering is largely an accounting question. I don't think Microsoft is spending all of that $10B on MSR, for example.
As a metric I don't think it provides much insight.
- antr 13y agoyou are spot on with that thought. accounting for r&d is pretty much an accounting/financial call. rather than accounting for costs, you capitalise that cost/capex as an asset, which can later be amortised in x years. i'm guessing that given that apple generates billions in profits, it would rather account much of its r&d as an operating expense, reducing the immediate tax bill.
- devfeed 13y agoMSR is only "R" (and that too only a subset of the total research that happens throughout the company - the stuff that can be classified as "basic science"/longer-term), the "D" happens all over the company in the various departments.