mumbai in what could be the highest research and development rd expenditure by an indian conglomerate the salttosoftware tata group spends rs 16000 crore or 26 billion on innovations as the cyrus mistryled enterprise bets big on new technologies to boost growth the diversified indian multinational spends 25 of its revenue on rd which is much higher than the governments rd spend of 09 of the countrys gross domestic product gdp a significant amount of the total rd expenditure by the 103billion conglomerate goes into automotive software materials and metallurgy with tata motors being the most lavish spender within the group the other major spenders within the group are tata steel tata consultancy services tcs and tata global beverages the groups research bill has gone up by 28 from rs 12500 crore three years ago while nano remains its flagbearer of innovation the groups other pathbreaking products include titan edge the thinnest watch and tata swach the worlds lowcost water purifier the conglomerate under the tata innovista programme has been conducting research in several areas like products services processes digitization and design expecting them to deliver billions of dollars in revenue launched in 2006 the tata innovista programme promotes innovation across tata companies worldwide over the past decade it has seen a 15fold increase in innovation across 70 companies the top innovation projects this year are expected to deliver an estimated benefit of 11 billion annually the tata group said