Cordova Research Group spent more than thirty years conducting pure and applied research for a variety of external customers. With the reduction, however, in R&D funding, Cordova decided that the survival of the firm would be based upon becoming a manufacturing firm as well as performing R&D. The R&D culture was close to informal project management with the majority of the personnel holding advanced degrees in technical disciplines. To enter the manufacturing arena would require hiring hundreds of new employees, mostly nondegreed.