Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) affect decisions, research efforts, and are strongly related to the goals of the RD&E activity, as they can differ based on the type of the project, e.g. applied projects, research explorations, and so on.
In the last decades, the role played by performance measurement in helping organizations achieve and sustain their competitive advantage has been clearly established and acknowledged by management literature. During the ‘90s, some revolutionary changes such as technology fusion and proliferation, shortening of product life cycles and increased competition pushed managers towards the measurement and assessment of the R&D performance, even more than before.