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Engineering Research &

Development
Methodology

Basic Concepts in R&D

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Basic Concepts in R&D

 Engineering
 Engineering & Technology
 Research & Development
 Research & Innovation
 Importance of R&D
 Role of Government in R&D
 Reflective Thinking
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What is Engineering?
 The concept of engineering was derived from the dawn
of human history
 Our ancestors developed & designed tools that were
essential for their survival.
 Human beings can be defined by
─ their tool-making, designing & engineering skills, &
─ the socialization & communication that facilitated the
invention, innovation & transfer of technology.
 This activity is similar to the modern idea of engineering where
trial & error is an important part of innovation.
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What is Engineering?
 Engineering is the field or discipline, practice, profession & art
that
 relates to the development, acquisition & application of
technical, scientific & mathematical knowledge
 about thengadu
tin
sder, design, development, invention, innovation & use
of materials, machines, structures, systems & processes for
specificpurposes.
 Engineering in the modern sense relates to art
 appreciated in the creativity & elegance of manyengineered
objects & structures
 Example : objects & structures of art exhibitions.
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What is Engineering?
Fields of Engineering closely related with CSE/SE
 Computer & Systems Engineering
 Research, design & development of computer, computer
systems & devices.
 Electrical Engineering & Electronic Engineering
 Research, design & development of electrical systems &
electronic devices.
 Software Engineering
 Research, design & development of computer software systems
& programming.
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What is Engineering?
 Engineering connects to the natural sciences, & to the
social & human sciences.
 Engineers use both scientific knowledge & mathematics ot create
technologies & infrastructure to address human, social &
economic issues.
 Engineers connect social needs with innovation &
commercial applications.
 Technological change & innovation is
─ one of the major drivers of economic, social & human
change,
─ so engineering & technology & the social sciences are more
closely connected.
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What is Engineering?
 Engineering powered the Industrial Revolution
 took off in the UK in the 18th C spreading to the world,
 replacing muscle by machine in a synergistic combination between
knowledge & capital.
 The 1st Industrial Revolution (1750–1850)
• focused on the textile industry
 The 2nd Industrial Revolution(1850–1900)  The
• focused on steam & the railways revolutions
 happened
The 3rd Industrial Revolution (1875–1925)
mainly due
•based on steel, electricity & heavy engineering to
 Engineering
The 4th Industrial Revolution (1900–1950)
R & D too
• based on oil, the automobile & mass production
 The 5th Industrial Revolution (from 1950)
• based on information & telecommunications
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What is Engineering?
 The great days of engineering were in the past
 during the era of massive mechanization & urbanization
that had its heyday in the 19thC
 improved the health & well-being of the common
person with improvements in water supply & sanitation.
 That era of great engineering enjoyed two
advantages:
 seemingly unlimited sources of power, coal, oil &
gas, &
 boundless capacity in terms of water supply, materials &
other resources relative to human need.
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What is Engineering?
 The tasks confronting engineers of the 21st C are:
 Climate change : engineering the world to avert an
environmental crisis caused in part by earlier generations in
terms of energy use, greenhouse gas emissions & their
contribution to climate change, &
 Poverty reduction: engineering the large proportion of the
world’s increasing population out of poverty, & the associated
problems encapsulated by the UN MDGs.
 Resolving these issues will require tremendous
innovation & ingenuity by engineers.
 It demands Engineering R&D
Engineering & Technology
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Engineering & Technology
 Technology is an enabling package or tool formed of
knowledge, devices, systems, processes & other
technologies created for a specific purpose.
 It is the engineering process that creates technology, &
which makes technology useful to people.
 Technological change is a complex process that must be
managed all the way from concept to the market place.
 Researchers in technology would be well advised to address
customer & societal needs & market requirements & not just
research for research or technology’s sake.
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Engineering & Technology

 Thus, questions to be considered include :

 What is the societal problem?
 What is the technological challenge?
 What is the business driver?
 How to define the research project?
 What are the findings/results?
 What are the potential applications?
Research & Development
(R&D)
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R&D
 R&D refers to two intertwined processes of
 research (to identify new knowledge & ideas) &
 development (turning the ideas into tangible products or
processes).
 R&D can be defined as
 the process of creating new products, processes &
technologies that can be used & marketed.
 The OECD defines R&D as
 “creative work undertaken on a systematic basis in order to
increase the stock of knowledge of man, culture & society, &
the use of this stock of knowledge to devise new
applications.”
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R&D
 In order to provide functional & understandable
definitions for various research activities, Science
Indicators categorizes R&D activities as efforts in science
& engineering as follows:
 Producing significant advances across the broad front of
understanding of natural & social phenomena—basic research
 Fostering inventive activity to produce technological advances
— applied research & development
 Combining understanding & invention in the form of socially
useful & affordable products & processes— innovation
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R&D
 The National Science Foundation (NSF) classifies
research as (Science & Engineering Indicators, 2008):
 Basic Research
 Objective : “a more complete knowledge or understanding of the
subject under study, without specific applications in mind.”
 Applied Research
 To gain “knowledge or understanding to determine the means
by which a specific, recognized need may be met.”
 includes investigations “to discovering new scientific
knowledge that has specific commercial objectives with
respect to products, processes, or services.”
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R&D

 The National Science Foundation (NSF) classifies …

 Development
 the “systematic use of the knowledge or understanding
gained from research, directed toward the production of
useful materials, devices, systems or methods, including
design & development of prototypes & processes.”
 R&D covers many of these activities.
Research & Innovation
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Research & Innovation
 Innovation is often associated &/or confused with the
word research.
 Undoubtedly, research & innovation are part of an
integrated, iterative feedback loop, where the creation &
discovery of knowledge stimulate innovation, which, in
turn, produces new stimuli & requirements to drive &
enrich the research agenda.
 However, even if strongly related to each other, research
& innovation do have specific differences & characteristics
that need to be carefully assessed & understood.
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Research & Innovation
 Research is the creation of knowledge, whereas
innovation is the application of research results to
create new processes, products, & services.
 In research, the focus is on knowledge creation &
discovery; in innovation, the focus is on
transforming knowledge into something usable by
someone operating in a specific market or, in
general, in some part of society.
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Research & Innovation : Example 1
 Edison invented the lightbulb in 1879.
 It was a brilliant, historic result that has changed our viles
forever. However, 19th C towns didn’t have a power grid,
which was not even a concept at that time.
 To bring it to the market, Edison formulated the
electric power distribution grid & a company to build &
manage it. Eventually, in 1882 Edison was able to bring
his new service to 59 customers in Manhattan.
 In general, Edison’s invention took years to materialize
across the whole society, as it demanded the creation of a
totally new industry & business sector.
Research & Innovation : Example 1

THOMAS EDISON
 (Feb 11, 1847 – Oct 18, 1931) was an
American inventor & businessman.
 He developed many devices that
greatly influenced life around the
world, including the phonograph,
the motion picture camera, & a long-
lasting, practical electric light bulb.
 Edison is the fourth most prolific
inventor in history, holding 1,093 US
patents in his name, as well as
many patents in the UK, France, &
Germany.
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Research & Innovation : Example 1
 Edison is known as an inventor, but he was also a
great innovator.
 an invention brings an idea into tangible reality by
embodying it as a product or system.
 An innovation converts a new idea into revenues &
profits.
 For an invention to become an innovation, people must be
willing to buy it in high enough numbers that the firm
benefits from making it.
 Edison’s lab was an applied research lab, which is a alb
that develops & commercializes its research findings.
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Research & Innovation : Example 2
 In the 1960s, object orientation was a purely
research result that had no practical impact.
 In the 1970s, Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research Center)
launched Smalltalk, which had a huge impact in the
research community, but a limited market success.
 Eventually, the knowledge accumulated over the
years was exploited in the 1990s, with development
of a new breed of programming languages &
systems, & bringing object orientation to market
success with C++ & later with Java.
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Research & Innovation
Importance of R&D
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Importance of R&D

The Global R&D Outlook

Global R&D spending has continued its steady climb with more than $2
trillion being invested for the third consecutive year in 2018.
***
More than two-thirds of all global R&D investments are supported by
industrial organizations. Of these industries, ICT is expected to be the
main driver of innovations among all of them over the next ten years.
***
Artificial intelligence, automation & robotics & associated software
involved in ICT will change the overall R&D environment—& much of
society—by the mid-2020s.
Bea Riemschneider
Science Editorial Director
R&D Magazine
www.RDmag.com
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Importance of R&D
 Companies undertake R&D in order to develop new
products, services, or procedures that will help them
grow & expand their operations.
 Companies invest in R&D to gain a pipeline of new
products.
 For a high-tech company like Apple, it means coming up with
new types of products as well as newer & better versions of
its existing computers & iPhones.
 From investing in R&D, the nation’s economy
benefits as well
 in the long run, growth in GNP per worker is due more ot
technological progress than to mere capital investment.
The Role of Government
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The Role of Government
 Governments can play a big role in innovation
because of their ability to fund R&D.
 offering grants to universities & research centers or by
offering contracts to corporations for performing
research.
 Governments can also provide tax incentives for
companies that invest in R&D.
 For example, Australia gave a 125 percent tax deduction for R&D
expenses. The Australian government’s website noted, “It’s little
surprise then, that many companies from around the world are
choosing to locate their R&D facilities in Australia.”
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The Role of Government
 Governments can promote innovation through
investments in infrastructure that will support new
technology & by committing to buy the new
technology.
 Since 2000, China has had a policy in place to encourage tech
transfer from abroad & to force foreign companies to transfer
their R&D operations to China in exchange for access to China’s
large volume markets.
 For example, any automobile manufacturer that wants to sell cars
in China must enter into a partnership with a Chinese company. As
a result, General Motors (GM), Daimler, Hyundai, Volkswagen
(VW), & Toyota have all formed joint ventures with Chinese
companies.
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The Role of Government
 Governments can set high targets that require
innovation.
 In the 1960s, the US Apollo space program launched by
President John F. Kennedy inspired US corporations to work
toward putting a man on the moon.
 The government’s investments in the Apollo program sped up the
development of computer & communications technology & also
led to innovations in fuel cells, water purification, freeze-drying
food, & digital image processing now used in medical products
for CAT scans & MRIs.
 Governments can also play a big role in the
protection of intellectual property rights
Computer Science & Engineering UG Program
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The Role of Government- Ethiopia
 Research & Technology Transfer
 The GoE considers investment in R&D a necessary precondition
for a sustained development not only of ICT but also for scientific
progress.
 In recognition of the important role that R&D transfer plays in
facilitating the country’s socio-economic development process
in general & ICT in particular, the Government commits itself
to the following specific objectives & strategies.
 Goal: Develop the nation's ICT R & D capacity to support, facilitate
& contribute to the development of the nation
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The Role of Government- Ethiopia
 Objectives
 To ensure that research projects & programs aimed at solving
logical problems, meet national needs & enhance the
development of professional skills.
 To support R&D transfer within research-oriented
institutions.
 To harness R&D transfer capabilities & global best
practices by promoting collaboration between the
country’s ICT centers of excellence & those of other
countries.
 To encourage participation in research undertakings by C
IT
professionals.
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The Role of Government- Ethiopia
 Strategies
 Develop an ICT R&D transfer policy & strategy.
 Allocate adequate resources /budget to R&D transfer for
hardware & software development, communications,
information networks, technology etc.
 Promote applied & need-based R&D transfer activities os as to
increase the levels of technological innovation.
 Promote R&D transfer in areas such as
─ standard character set, language interoperability, electronic
dictionaries & thesaurus uses, & multilingual search engines for
widely spoken indigenous languages, in order to facilitate
accessibility.
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The Role of Government- Ethiopia

 Strategies
 Network R&D transfer activities conducted by public &
private establishments for sharing best practices from
lessons learned across sectors.
 Provide different incentives to the private sector to invest in R&D
transfer activities.
 Disseminate information on new development in ICT
arising from research findings.
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Reflective Thinking
 Check your understanding about Engineering, Technology
, Invention, Innovation , Research , R&D, and other
related concepts.
 What do you think about the argument “Researchers in
technology would be well advised to address customer &
societal needs & market requirements & not just research
for research or technology’s sake.”?
 What benefits does a company get by investing in
R&D?
 Describe the ways in which government can
influence R&D.
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References

 UNESCO, 2010. Engineering: Issues Challenges and

Opportunities for Development, Paris: UNESCO.
 The Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (2009). The National
Information & Communication Technology Policy & Strategy. Addis
Ababa, Ethiopia
 2018 Global R&D Funding Forecast : a supplement to R&D
Magazine
 Jain, R. K. (2010).Managing research, development and
innovation : managing the unmanageable
 Kothari(2004).Research Methodology : methods &
techniques