> In terms of why the public funds research, your statement might be true

Yes this is what I meant. We fund research because we think pure research is valuable. It needs to be done without requiring a financial return. Products sometimes come out of it and that's also a public benefit, but direct results of the research are not a "product" they are the starting point to a possible product. There is still a lot of development that has to occur to get to the product stage.