I work for a megacorp. We spend a great deal of cash on self-funded projects to move the state of the art forward in our division's particular niche (avionics). We released a product ~6 years ago that fundamentally changed the computing architecture for modern airplanes (in this case, 787). I work with extraordinarily brilliant people who are given many opportunities to have their cutting edge ideas heard, funded, and executed. While we don't do a lot of basic scientific research, we do plenty of technological research on the absolute cutting edge of our discipline. From what I know of our other industrial divisions, they similarly do cutting edge R&D in their respective fields. I'd hardly say that my megacorp is stifling innovation (quite the opposite, actually). We do have tiny cubes, though :) (but hey - I agree that the money is better spent on R&D, so I have no complaints). I know that not all megacorps and their jobs are quite so awesome, but I can vouch for the fact that some are. As a side benefit, the airframer duopoly prevents distracting patent wars among subcontractors very effectively, leaving us with more resources to work on fun problems.