Microsoft’s research and development expenditure amounted to around ** billion U.S. dollars in its 2024 fiscal year, a record high. Microsoft ranks second among software and computer service companies worldwide in terms of R&D spend, behind only Google’s parent company Alphabet. Microsoft Corporation One of the most successful tech companies worldwide, Microsoft, together with its most famous product, the Windows operating system, has long been a household name. The company’s fiscal year 2021 not only witnessed a record spending for R&D, but also a record high in terms of annual sales – Microsoft brought in ****** billion U.S. dollars in net sales that year, proving that their businesses are stronger than ever, after years of continued success. Microsoft's Diverse businesses Some of Microsoft’s major business ventures include the above-mentioned Windows operating system, software packages such as Microsoft Office, various lines of consumer electronics, as well as cloud computing offerings. Microsoft’s productivity and business processes segment, which include products such as Office 365 and LinkedIn, brought in around **** billion U.S. dollars in the 2021 fiscal year.

In the fiscal year 2024, Microsoft Corporation spent 24.46 billion U.S. dollars on sales and marketing, the company’s highest annual expenditure to date. In the past decade, Microsoft has slowly increased sales and marketing spending, with the annual figure rising by more than six billion U.S. dollars during that time. Microsoft also spend heavily on research and development, with spending in this domain also amounting to over 29 billion U.S. dollars in FY2024. Microsoft Corporation Founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen in 1975, Microsoft has since grown into one of the most successful tech firms in the world and has experienced decades of continued success. The company’s famous Windows operating system, its lines of consumer electronics, and its popular software packages such as Microsoft Office have become widely popular for both business and personal usage. Continuously innovating and adapting, Microsoft has come to offer different cloud computing services and its intelligence cloud segment has become the biggest revenue earner for the company. Microsoft's cloud offerings include Azure, the infrastructure platform, and Office 365, the collaboration suite. Tech Industry As technology becomes further integrated into nearly all aspects of daily life, companies such as Apple, Alphabet, and Microsoft have grown into some of the most powerful entities in the world. Spending in the IT industry alone amounts to trillions of dollars each year, meaning that these tech giants are well-positioned for continued success.

The 2024 fiscal year marked a slight increase in Oracle Corporation’s research and development spending, the yearly total climbing to 8.9 billion U.S. dollars from the 6.5 figure recorded in 2021. Following years of dramatically expanding R&D budgets, the company seems to have slowed R&D budget expansion and stabilized the figure at around seven to eight billion. Oracle Founded in 1977, Oracle is a tech company primarily focused on relational database technology. Today, Oracle ranks among the largest companies in the world in terms of market value and serves as the world’s most popular database management system provider. In addition to its investment into R&D, the company is also known for its use of acquisitions to promote growth, with high profile purchases including Sun Microsystems, PeopleSoft, and NetSuite. Research and Development spending As one of the largest software and computer services companies, Oracle is also among the biggest R&D spenders. However, many of the company’s peers tend to spend far more on R&D, with Alphabet, Microsoft, and Facebook all spending well over ten billion euros in 2019/20.

Amazon spent the most on research and development in the fiscal year 2022, with over ** billion U.S. dollars. Meta, Alphabet, Apple, and Huawei rounded out the top five of companies with the highest R&D spending that year. Leading by innovation Spending money on research and development, or R&D, is how a company innovates new technologies and conducts research to develop new products and services. R&D allows companies, such as Amazon, to stay ahead of their competition and work towards the future. Most of the R&D spending in the world in 2021 was within health & pharma, which should be seen in light of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the United States is the leading country for R&D expenditure in the world. AI and R&D Currently, many companies are investing in Artificial Intelligence (AI) innovation, including the ethical implications of AI and how it can be used to better society as a whole. Major companies, such as Amazon and Alphabet, are throwing their collective weight into this issue and conducting research into its future applications.