Brill Co. made the following expenditures during 1992:

Costs to develop computer software for use in Brill's general management information system                                $100,000

Costs of market research activities        &n bsp;         &n bsp;        $75,000

What amount of these expenditures should Brill report in its 1992 income statement as research and developement costs? (d)

d. 0

I know market search activities doesn't belong to R&D. But why isn't "costs to develop computer software for use in Brill's general management information system" R&D?

On text book, it is said " Research is the planned efforts of a copmany to discover new information that will help either create a new product, service, process, or techinique or significantly improve the one in current use"

"Costs to develop computer software for use in Brill's general management information system"

Nothing in this description suggests that the software will "help either create a new product, service, process, or techinique or significantly improve the one in current use."  It just says they're costs incurred to develop computer software for use in the company's own systems. Absent the information, the default would be to assume that the various costs would be capitalized or expensed, depending on their individual nature; they're not really R&D costs under this definition.

"for use in Brill's general management information system"

The software is being developed for internal use.  The costs should be capitalized, not expensed as R&D.