Apple spent $844 million on R&D in the calendar year 2007, just 3.2% of its revenue over that time. In contrast, Microsoft, which spent the most on R&D of any tech company, spent $7.4 billion, or 12.8% of its revenue, according to numbers compiled by CIO Zone.

In all, the top 50 R&D spenders plowed more than $50 billion into new products and services in 2007, spending an average of 9.7% of revenue on R&D.

The rest of the top 10 is a who’s who of tech companies. After Microsoft came IBM ($6.2 billion), Intel ($5.8 billion), Cisco ($4.7 billion), and H-P ($3.6 billion). Oracle ($2.5 billion), SAP ($2.3 billion), Google ($2.1 billion), Sun ($1.9 billion), and AMD ($1.8 billion) rounded out the top 10.

Google’s total was $890 million, or 74%, more than it spent on R&D last year, according to CIO Zone, making it the biggest mover in terms of dollars spent. Yahoo, which spent $1 billion R&D in 2007, increased its spending 30% from the year before. Other companies that increased R&D spending greatly are VMWare ($286 million, up 93%), Red Hat ($91 million, up 47%), and Salesforce.com ($64 million, up 43%).

Consequently, it is important that how to manage R&D process effectively rather than high budget expenses.