Bell Labs was an astonishing place for many decades, though it fell on somewhat hard times during the telecom meltdown some years ago, as its corporate owner had to cope with shrinking markets.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
I found that my career at Bell Telephone Labs thrived because of the environment, which encouraged cooperative research, offered opportunities for access to sophisticated equipment, and fellowship.
It used to be that the only ones with access to cutting-edge technology were top government labs, big companies and the ultra-rich. It was simply too expensive for the rest of us to afford.
Virtually every real breakthrough in technology had a bubble which burst, left a lot of people broke who'd invested in it, but also left the infrastructure for this next golden age, effectively.
I literally worked at research labs where the staff really tried to steer management away from the modern technology that was actually better.
An awful lot of successful technology companies ended up being in a slightly different market than they started out in.
It seemed to me the perfect company for the 21st century would be one that was technology-orientated with great content and national scale.
As to Bell's talking telegraph, it only creates interest in scientific circles... its commercial values will be limited.
I managed Hewlett Packard through the worst technology downturn in 25 years, the dotcom bust.
When I was in graduate school in consumer science and math, all of the big companies had labs, all doing blue sky research.
Tech is a funny industry; I don't think there is any other industry on the planet that reinvents itself every 10-12 years.
No opposing quotes found.