Why are the R&D labs so bad?

摘要

Every year major companies such as Cisco, IBM, Lucent and Nortel spend 6% to 10% of their budgets on research and development, yet are often blindsided by hot young companies. Last month, Juniper paid $3.3 billion for NetScreen ― and I couldn't be happier because Battery Ventures, a firm 1 co-founded, had NetScreen stock. But it raises the question of why the industry's large R&D laboratories never seem to get it right.