But most of the people in the &#x27;Research&#x27; departments of companies will have PhDs. For example, see the list of full-time positions at MSR [0]: both &#x27;Researcher&#x27; positions require a PhD (Researcher - &quot;Successful candidates will have a Ph.D&quot;, Post-Doc Researcher - &quot;Applicants must have completed the requirements for a PhD, including submission of their thesis, prior to joining Microsoft Research&quot;), and it sounds like it is helpful for some of the &#x27;Technical&#x27; postions (Research Software Development Engineers - &quot;RSDEs are strong software developers with a Bachelor’s Degree, and often a Masters or Ph.D. in computer science&quot;). There are &#x27;Non-PhD Researcher Opportunities&#x27;, but only in India and China.<p>[0]: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;research.microsoft.com&#x2F;en-us&#x2F;jobs&#x2F;fulltime&#x2F;default.aspx" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;research.microsoft.com&#x2F;en-us&#x2F;jobs&#x2F;fulltime&#x2F;default.as...</a>