SBM believes in basic research and the value of doing that research in a small and focused environment. It’s an oft-stated lament that US companies don’t do basic scientific research any more, and we believe one reason is the cost and overhead of internal research at large corporations. We’ve found that:
- 3-8% of total revenue in an established technology company is typically spent on developing new products
- 60-80% of this cost is human resources associated with staffing and managing a technology development team
- For small projects (and small companies), the economy of scale is worse
- Engineering tools, software, bench space and instrumentation are additional major cost centers
Working with SBM can boost your R&D efforts and gain competitive advantage. Personnel costs can be phased and managed, and fixed costs can be amortized. Allow us to execute, while you focus on key strategy and value creation specific to your market sector. We’re a service-based company, and provide support for customers’ projects, rather than concentrating on developing our own intellectual property. We generally operate on a time and materials or milestones-driven contract basis under a standard two-way non-disclosure agreement.