Apple Spent $4.5 Billion This Year On R&D

The public expects Apple to churn out innovative products each year, or at least updated versions of their existing productions with a few innovations here and there. Surely this can not be achieved without substantial investment being made into research and development. It has been discovered through Apple’s annual Form 10-K filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission that the company’s R&D expenses were up 32 percent this year. Apple has spent $4.5 billion on research and development alone this year, that almost the amount for which BlackBerry, an entire company, is likely to be sold.

Last year, Apple’s R&D expenditures stood at $3.4 billion, a 39 percent increase in itself from $2.4 billion spent on R&D in 2011. Apple accounts the increase in expenditure to increase in personnel, also to increased expenditures it had to make to support expanded activities. Apple believes that “focused investments” in R&D are crucial to its future growth, the filing states, and that it expects to make further investments in this sector down the line. $4.5 billion is merely a fraction of the huge pile of cash Apple is sitting on, at the end of its previous quarter, the company had nearly $150 billion in cash reserves. The filing also mentions Apple’s plans to spend $11 billion on capital expenditures next year, earmarking $550 million just for retail store facilities. 30 new stores are expected to be opened around the globe next year, with 20 existing stores likely to be remodeled.

Adnan Farooqui
Categories: Apple