> You had better start with an ENORMOUS capital to
> support all the potential equipment that anyone could
> want.
Maybe finding more business partners will raise enough
capital for starting up?
> But why do you think that the price of equipment
> rental (which certainly must cover the purchase price) plus
> overhead plus salaries of your staff plus profit will come
> out to less than researchers buying their own equipment?
This is similar to car-pooling -- it makes the purchase
of equipment to be more cost-effective, especially for
those really expensive ones.
> Note that the university already pays for the laboratory
> space and overhead -- lights, HVAC, gas/air/DW, hood
> ventilation, etc. Plus many departments have shared
> facilities for many high cost pieces of equipment.
Universities usually dont rent out their equipments and
i think in any university there are always more people
with research ideas than openings available for them...
> Further, after I rent some of your equipment for several
> years and it becomes obsolete because of technical
> developments, who is going to continue paying the
> rental for the remainder of you estimated life of the item?
Obsolesence can be more or less estimated... and some
suppliers accept trade-in for newer equipment.
> And how are you going to handle the enormous
> diversity of types of research -- everyone uses their own
> variety of equipment?
maybe collaborating with other labs?
> Not to mention the fact that
> my lab facilities are down the hall from my office and my
> teaching and all my colleagues. I also have other
> campus responsibilities, like serving on department
> executive committees, the faculty senate, participating
> in search committees --- for which my presence on
> campus is essential. Not only that, my students
> who work in my lab also have to have access to classes
> (not to mention their families and friends).
i agree that finding a good location is important; Also
maybe it is possible to let people hire lab technicians
to do experiments for them online, the results data sent
back to them!?!?
> I can't imagine any university research operation willing
> to participate in what you want. Corporate research also
> would be concerned about security of confidential
> information and would be reluctant to have "in house"
> research done "out of house". And they already have
> university contracts for those areas which they are
> willing to conduct outside.
confidentiality is not always important, i've seen some
corporations publishing their research in order to find
more partners. i think that if the project is 'special'
or difficult enough then competition is less important
than collaboration.... do you agree?
Thanks for your reply =)