R&D -- the 100 Biggest Spending Firms

Read "R&D 100" by Ron Hira and Harry Goldstein in the IEEE Spectrum Online.

"The 100 companies, taken as a whole, increased their R&D spending by a healthy 7.6 percent in 2004, to US $254 billion. The pharmaceuticals and biotechnology sector actually cut back by 1.1 percent, to $51.7 billion [see box, "Sector Trends"], mirroring a sales drop of 1.6 percent.......Pharmaceuticals and biotechnology ranks as the second most research-intensive industry, just behind software and services........The five years of R&D Top 100 data from the fiscal years 2000 to 2004 show that the top 100 leaders increased their R&D spending by 21 percent—from $210 billion in 2000 to $254 billion in 2004. R&D intensity in 2004 decreased slightly for the group as a whole, from 6.4 percent to 6.1 percent, as sales jumped by 12.3 percent. But that rosy picture certainly doesn't hold for every industry. Each sector has a different story to tell."