But those with low maturity are more likely to have smaller budgets.
We asked respondents about their total research budget last fiscal year.1 In this report, we will refer to budgets in four categories: low- (<$25K), low-mid- ($25K+-100K), upper-mid- ($100K+-$500K), and high-investment ($500K+). For the sample, we found budgets were pretty evenly distributed. While the plurality of research budgets (29%) fell in the lowest investment group, each corresponding budget tier had a similar distribution—even when looking at industry, maturity, and company size. One fifth each had low-mid investment or high-mid investment. And just under one fifth (17%) said their budget was in the highest investment group.
For the most part, budget size didn’t correlate with maturity. For the highest and middle maturity teams, budgets were equally distributed across the four budget categories (low, low-mid, high-mid, and high). The only exception to this was low maturity teams: 73% of those who rated themselves a 1 or 2 in this category fell into the lowest budget bucket—suggesting that less mature teams may still be building their case for funding.
1. Last fiscal year/this fiscal year: Not every budget resets in January. We created our baseline budgets based on last fiscal year’s budget so it’d be a static number for every participant. When we asked comparative forecasts in regards to the current fiscal year, we referred to an organization's currently used budget.
Click through the graphics to get a good sense of the companies, teams, and research strategies behind each budget size.
