Net Results: It once was one of the most famous technology research laboratories in the world, where most of modern personal computing was invented - from the graphical user interface to ethernet to laser printing.

But now, the place formerly known as Xerox PARC, or Palo Alto Research Center,is busy reinventing itself as an independent research lab - PARC without the Xerox, more or less - and seeking the right path to financial independence.

One says more or less, because Xerox is still the lab's number one client after Xerox incorporated the laboratory in 2002, leaving PARC in the slightly odd position of on the one hand, being a research company owned by Xerox,but on the other, encouraging what the company calls strategic partnerships at PARC with other non-competitive companies.

That means PARC's 160 employees do research for client companies that aren't Xerox, and PARC is striving to make its own way as a research lab.

"Our view of the world has broadened significantly," saysMark Bernstein, chief executive of PARC. "We still view the world through the lens of Xerox, and the importance of documents."

But now researchers have had to think about projects from a commercial standpoint - commercial for other companies, that is.

Can the lab be a success as PARC, and not Xerox PARC?

When Xerox announced it would untether the lab back in 2002, the announcement was met with mixed reactions - with many expressing concern at what might become of the famed lab. Its demise was even predicted by some commentators, but such pessimism has turned out to be exaggerated.

Rather than collapsing, the lab, tucked away in an idyllic Californian landscape near Stanford University, of rolling oak-covered hills filled with grazing horses, should get about half its revenue from clients other than Xerox this year, says Bernstein.

"Double-digit millions" will come in for non-Xerox sponsored research, he says. Who is paying for such work?

He will only comment on a partnership with Fujitsu and work done for bio-sciences organisation the Scripps Research Institute.

PARC is cagey about who it works with, what specific projects are, and what the end goals of such research might be - outside the general statement that all work is viewed as collaborative and needs to in some way be productive for PARC as well as for the client.

That's not to say that PARC wants to commercialise research itself.Bernstein, as well as several researchers who make presentations on a day visit to the lab, are quick to emphasise PARC is creating neither products nor services for itself.

But it will carry out commercial research on behalf of clients, and license technologies it invents so that others pay to use the intellectual property generated.

"What PARC does is build deep competencies in specific areas and then combine them in other applications," says Jennifer Ernst, communications manager for PARC. In other words, PARC will do the geek stuff, and then clients can seek the application of that work in areas where it might have commercial applications.

Central to PARC's way of doing research is its open, sharing environment - discussion and debate between divisions within PARC is not just tolerated, but absolutely encouraged.

But while such an approach may have been fruitful when PARC had one client, Xerox, how can this function when PARC works with several other clients, each of which wishes to keep what it is doing secret?

Surely there are conflicts of interest? Bernstein insists not.

First of all, other clients are not in competition with Xerox, so the big company, which pumps $900 million (€695 million) annually into R&D (with 15 to 20 per cent going to PARC), isn't breathing down the necks of PARC clients.

Clear lines are drawn around projects and specific details of a project are never shared, he says, although general aspects of a project and broader applications may be discussed.

PARC also needs to find some benefit in a given research project, or it won't do it, says Bernstein. "If someone is interested in solving a specific problem that doesn't represent an opportunity for PARC to learn from it, it doesn't have any interest for us," he says.

And what PARC learns flows back to Xerox ultimately, in one way or another, most likely as a deepening of competency in a given area that may lead to a product or service for the company - or a licensing opportunity.

"PARC remains a key element of Xerox technology strategy," says Herve Gallaire, chief technology officer for Xerox and president,Xerox innovation group.

This circular relationship, if a bit odd,seems to be working so far.

With its own intellectual property, its own business development team, and its own revenue, PARC is clearly now an entity in its own right.

klillington@irish-times.ie weblog: http://weblog.techno-culture.com