Research: Patents The following data are based on information from the Harvard Business Review (Vol. 72, No. 1). Let x be the number of different research programs, and let y be the mean number of patents per program. As in any business, a company can spread itself too thin. For example, too many research programs might lead to a decline in overall research productivity. The following data are for a collection of pharmaceutical companies and their research programs:

x 10 12 14 16 18 20 y 1.8 1.7 1.5 1.4 1.0 0.7 Complete parts

(a) through (e), given x 5 90, y 5 8.1, x2 5 1420, y2 5 11.83, xy 5 113.8, and r < 0.973.

(f) Suppose a pharmaceutical company has 15 different research programs.
What does the least-squares equation forecast for y 5 mean number of patents per program?