This article shows something rather phenomenal; that Apple's R&D costs have fallen as a percentage of Sales whilst rising rapidly. Nonetheless they still rank only 45th globally in total spend.

The dip in spending in 1998 is due to Steve Job's "Focus" and; whilst pointing to Job's astonishing record is an old game, it really does show how important one individual can be to a pure technology company. Apple simply out-thought or out-innovated the competition.

And to put this in perspective, Apple's competition arguably includes all the other Silicon Valley superstar genius sky-rocket success stories.

So what can we learn? Perhaps not much about business but a bit about how important and transformative each of us can be.