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Get Four
|  | AUGUST 25, 2004
Where the Fantastic Meets the Future Cherry Murray of Bell Labs talks about nanotechnology, "network convergence," the pace at which theories becomes fact Bell Labs has been a fount of innovation since its founding in 1925. Now the research center for Lucent Technologies (LU ), Bell Labs has been fundamental in many technologies taken for granted today, including computer and phone networks. Cherry Murray, senior vice-president for physical sciences research, has been with Bell Labs for 26 years and has seen major innovations go from research to development. BusinessWeek's Sarah R. Shapiro recently spoke with Murray about where she sees innovation going in the next 20 years. Edited excerpts from their conversation follow: Q: How has the corporate lab system changed during the past 20 years? A: Corporate research is still extremely important in the U.S. -- over two-thirds of the research and development spending is done by corporations. The federal government used to account for two-thirds of R&D spending back in the '50s and '60s, but that trend has reversed and corporate labs are doing very well. In the past 20 years, large companies have become global and are no longer only focused on one market. Also, R&D around the globe was not possible when communication was only directly from person to person. The pace of R&D has gone up dramatically [with the advent of] the Internet. For example, in the '80s, as the first wavelength division multiplexing systems were being developed for optical communication systems, we had a research prototype: It took about seven years of development before we put out a product. Today research and development occurs simultaneously. There's no opportunity anymore to do research first and develop the technology gradually [for a number of reasons]: It is possible to communicate, the markets are fluctuating, there is global competition, and prices are coming down dramatically. So now, we may be developing some product and discover that we want to add another feature, so we would do concurrent scientific research and development. Also, small companies spring up very quickly now because of venture capital. So corporations are not isolated anymore from the science and technology environment. Q: Is this a healthy change? A: I think it's healthy. It's exciting! Q: Is enough basic research being done? A: Lots of basic research is getting done. At Bell Labs, about 20% of our research is science that will be commercial in 5 years to 10 years. Although, these days you can never be sure. You may think you're working on something that's 10 years out, but if you make a discovery, the technology can actually be commercialized sooner. Roughly 10% of the people at Bell Labs are doing science that's cool and could conceivably be relevant to communications, but those scientists are not thinking about products at all. Other people who are thinking about [developing] products, will say, "We can use that [technology] in developing this [other] kind of thing." That could drive more science and also really high-tech new products. This is the interplay between really cutting-edge science and really cutting-edge technology. Q: Are companies increasingly doing more research overseas? A: It depends. Every large corporation is a global corporation with global markets and customers. The real reason for going global with R&D is twofold: first, to connect with your customers; second, to make sure you're getting the world's best talent -- and the world's best talent doesn't necessarily come to the U.S.
BW MALL
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