Live data from Hacker News

The death of corporate research labs

blog.dshr.org

1–10 of 256 posts

Re: The death of corporate research labs

#3
I have often found it baffling that tech giants, with near unlimited resources to fund all sorts of things, don't establish these kinds of labs. I'm aware that there are many things called something like "{Google, Facebook, Twitter, ...} Labs" but from what I understand they are significantly different from the corporate research labs of old.

Re: The death of corporate research labs

#4

I have often found it baffling that tech giants, with near unlimited resources to fund all sorts of things, don't establish these kinds of labs. I'm aware that there are many things called something like "{Google, Facebook, Twitter, ...} Labs" but from what I understand they are significantly different from the corporate research labs of old.

"Fail fast" is not conducive to good research. It takes persistence in the face of failure.

Re: The death of corporate research labs

#6

I have often found it baffling that tech giants, with near unlimited resources to fund all sorts of things, don't establish these kinds of labs. I'm aware that there are many things called something like "{Google, Facebook, Twitter, ...} Labs" but from what I understand they are significantly different from the corporate research labs of old.

This is one thing that I really have to credit MS for doing right.

Re: The death of corporate research labs

#7

I have often found it baffling that tech giants, with near unlimited resources to fund all sorts of things, don't establish these kinds of labs. I'm aware that there are many things called something like "{Google, Facebook, Twitter, ...} Labs" but from what I understand they are significantly different from the corporate research labs of old.

Microsoft Research is a notable exception

Re: The death of corporate research labs

#8
I've worked in a couple of corporate research labs. Yes, you'll be expected to do more convincing about the value of your research for the company. That raises two problems:

- Some great researchers are not very good at convincing.

- From a purely financial standpoint some research does not make sense considering the risk (more ground breaking and longer usually means more risk).

I'm not sure that the alternative is not much better though.

Re: The death of corporate research labs

#10

I have often found it baffling that tech giants, with near unlimited resources to fund all sorts of things, don't establish these kinds of labs. I'm aware that there are many things called something like "{Google, Facebook, Twitter, ...} Labs" but from what I understand they are significantly different from the corporate research labs of old.

Aren't Google's "other bets" basically just huge research labs?
Post reply on HN