Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!yetti!geac!david From: david@geac.UUCP (David Haynes) Newsgroups: can.politics Subject: Re: Status of R&D in Canada Message-ID: <582@geac.UUCP> Date: Mon, 16-Mar-87 08:54:46 EST Article-I.D.: geac.582 Posted: Mon Mar 16 08:54:46 1987 Date-Received: Tue, 17-Mar-87 01:20:46 EST References: <3655@utai.UUCP> Reply-To: david@geac.UUCP (David Haynes) Distribution: can Organization: Geac Computers Intl. Toronto, CANADA Lines: 80 In article <3655@utai.UUCP> eem@utai.UUCP writes: >It is widely accepted that Canada spends proportionally significantly less >on R&D than the U.S. Assuming that this is true (R&D expenditures are >tricky to estimate correctly) I have seen a variety of explanations: > >1. Brain drain to the U.S. But the question is "Why?". I think the "brain drain" is more of a symptom than a cause. Most of the people I know who have gone to the 'states have done so because a) they are being offered a *lot* more money and b) the work is far more exciting/interesting. >2. Foreign-owned companies choose to perform R&D not in their Canadian >subsidiaries but in the US. And on the whole, this is the correct thing to do. As a business case, the U.S. market is far stronger (and larger) for high technology goods than is the Canadian market. In addition, Canadians have shown a strong trend toward accepting goods tailored for the U.S. market. Given these factors, why would any company do R&D in Canada? Maybe manufacturing, but not R&D. >3. Canadian companies are a lot smaller that their US counterparts >and therefore have limited R&D budgets. No, this doesn't work -- Japan spends far more than we do on a *per capita* basis. (In fact, I think we are ranked 6th or 7th in research dollars per capita --- this is a little fuzzy, it was on the radio about 2 months ago) >4. The Canadian economy depends to a large extent on the US for >technological know-how, and it can get away with it (or pay for it) >because Canada is well endowed with natural resources. It's more than that, Canadians are, by nature, conservative. They are not as willing to part with the amounts of money required to do serious R&D, especially with a strongly competitive neighbour to the south. The overall opinion seems to be one of "Why should we sink money into this R&D effort when there are probably 10 companies in the U.S. *all* of which are better staffed and funded, probably working on the problem right now. It's almost a point of self-induced inferiority. Canadians (in general) do not believe that they can compete with the U.S. in areas of technical development. With respect to "Getting away with it", I am not sure what it is *exactly* we are getting away with. As I see it, we are following an almost textbook example of supply and demand. We supply raw material, they supply processed material. Each for each other's demands. > >My own opinion is that all of the above are relevant explanations to >some extent and I was wondering what other people think. Comparison >with countries other than the US or Japan (e.g. France, Germany, Italy, >Sweden) could be useful. > >Evangelos E. Milios CSNet: eem@ai.toronto.edu >Department of Computer Science ARPA: eem%ai.toronto.edu@csnet-relay >University of Toronto UUCP: eem@utai.uucp OR >Toronto, Ontario, {ihnp4,decvax,decwrl}!utcsri!utai!eem >Canada, M5S 1A4 CDNNET: eem@ai.toronto.cdn >(416) 978-8737,978-6114 To me, it seems that you could paraphrase your question about R&D and place it in a purely Canadian context by asking, "Why is the most R&D development done in Ottawa or Toronto? (and maybe Vancouver)" Why not White Rock? Why not Sarnia? It seems clear from that context, that R&D is done where there is a large enough market to sustain it and that the amount of money spent in a particular area is proportional to the percieved size of the market. The Canada/U.S. comparison invokes feelings of nationalistic pride, but does not, in my humble opinion, really factor into the problem. -david- -- ========================================================================== David Haynes (utzoo!yetti!geac!david) Geac Computers International Inc. +1 416 475 0525 x 3420 350 Steelcase Road,Markham, Ontario, CANADA, L3R 1B3