Research and Development Employees by Country

This chart shows Research and Development Employees by Country.

Research and development is a general term for activities in connection with corporate or governmental innovation. Research and development is a component of Innovation and is situated at the front end of the Innovation life cycle. Innovation builds on R&D and includes commercialization phases.

The activities that are classified as R&D differ from company to company, but there are two primary models, with an R&D department being either staffed by engineers and tasked with directly developing new products, or staffed with industrial scientists and tasked with applied research in scientific or technological fields which may facilitate future product development. In either case, R&D differs from the vast majority of corporate activities in that it is not often intended to yield immediate profit, and generally carries greater risk and an uncertain return on investment.

An employee is a term for workers and managers working for a company, organisation or community. These people are the staff of the organization. Generally speaking, any person hired by an employer to do a particular job is an employee.In most modern economies the word "employee" means a person who works for a corporation. 

Research and development activities are conducted by specialized units or centers belonging to a company, or can be out-sourced to a contract research organization, universities, or state agencies. In the context of commerce, "research and development" normally refers to future-oriented, longer-term activities in science or technology, using similar techniques to scientific research but directed toward desired outcomes and with broad forecasts of commercial yield.

Research and development is of great importance in business as the level of competition, production processes and methods are rapidly increasing. It is of special importance in the field of marketing where companies watch competitors and customers closely in order to keep pace with modern trends and analyze the needs, demands and desires of their customers.