APPLIED SCIENCE AND INDUSTRIAL RESEARCH 217 



The technological status of industry has little permanency. 

 It is often assumed that those hrms that have developed large 

 amounts of technical skill Avill continue to dominate their 

 industries and that other industries will remain ^vithout any 

 corresponding scientific guidance. This is not true, how- 

 ever, as the Nuffield College report points out. Industrial 

 progress depends not only on the existence of large firms 

 carrying on research over a wide field but equally on the 

 continual emergence of ne^v^ firms animated by a scientific 

 spirit in their approach to industrial problems. 



Before 1920 the petroleum industry of the United States, 

 one of the most wealthy and po^verful industries, did very 

 little scientific research. Since then it has not merely estab- 

 lished scientific divisions and research laboratories, but it has 

 come to the very forefront of industrial scientific research 

 and has developed entirely new branches of industrial chem- 

 istry. This is no rare phenomenon. Again and again, a 

 change in management or the emergence in management of 

 one individual has revolutionized a manufacturing company 

 and eventually an industry. Thus, instead of a picture of a 

 static industrial world in w^hich there are giants and pygmies, 

 the facts show a Avorld in ^vhich the giants must ^vork unceas- 

 ingly to remain strong and the pygmies are continually grow- 

 ing and asserting their right to a place in the sun. 



It is asserted far too often that "small businesses cannot 

 afford to support scientific research." Few businesses can 

 afford to support research. They carry out their research, as 

 they do the rest of their operations, for profit, that is, to be 

 supported by it; and if they are successful, they do not remain 

 small, they gro^v. When Ernst Abbe joined Carl Zeiss, he 

 entered a very small business, ^vhich became the leading op- 

 tical industry of the world. Wlien Ludwig Mond joined John 

 Brunner, he founded a business w^hich became one of the 

 chief components of Imperial Chemical Industries. 



The Zeiss firm or the alkali works of the future are today 

 small firms with an active leader imbued Avith the spirit of 

 science. The problem for the small business, in fact, is not 



