How do we increase research and development speed

[Professor]

I'm just frustrated that I need to play late game to get the new ships and facilities. Any help would be appreciated

[Russian Orthodox Revolution]

You need to assign personnel that have research capabilities to planets that have the appropriate research facilities. For example, to do facility research, assign personnel that have facility research capabilities to planets with construction yards.

Info from the FAQ:

"ix) Research: There are three types of Research mission: Ship Design,
Troop Training, and Facility Research, but they're all inherently the same so I
put them under the same section. If a character can research a certain field
(it tell you in their status menu) then get them researching ASAP. It speeds up
R&D real fast, and there are always other characters to do spy work or be
officers (I always want to make Ackbar or Thrawn my main fleet's admiral, but
they can research ship design, so it's much better to make them research).
There seems to be no real difference between sending multiple people on a
research mission than sending them on individual ones, at least not that I can
see. I usually send them on individual missions however, because that way I can
spread them out across the galaxy, so if I lose one planet with a research
mission on it, I'll still have other missions working, instead of losing ALL my
research in that field. Ship design missions can only be conducted on planets
with shipyards, troop training missions on planets with training facilities,
and facility research missions on a planet with construction yards.
If a researcher sends you a message saying "valuable" results have been
produced, you just researched something in that field. If he says "no new
progress" just keep him running. It's a progressive mission and he'll make
progress eventually; just let him research until you've researched everything
in that field.
Now, there's only three ways for this type of mission to fail: 1. You're
an idiot like me and scrapped the relevant facilities on the planet the team is
researching on (at least once a game I will scrap the sole shipyard on the
planet that Wedge or Ackbar is researching ship design on because I don't need
it anymore and I forgot they were researching there. Remember, the relevant
facility has to be there, or they can't research). 2. One of the people
assigned to the mission is a traitor (see more about that under the Traitor
section) and keeps failing the mission on purpose. It's a very good sign that
someone has turned traitor, because it's impossible to fail the mission other
than these two ways. 3. The planet is invaded or switches sides. This mission
can only be conducted on a planet you own, so decoys are not necessary. In
fact, the only people who can become decoys for a Research mission are those
who can do research, so it's infinitely dumb to waste their talents as decoys.
I believe that your research rate in an area is also determined by the
number of production facilities in that area you have. I'm pretty sure that the
more you have, the faster you research. At the very least, I do know that if
you have none of a certain production facility then you will not research in
its area at all. Each additional facility you have however seems to contributes
VERY little to your research rate, so it's pointless to have facilities that
aren't building, just so they can research. Facilities contribute a near
insignificant amount; it's your research missions that do the bulk of the work."

[ReoHays]

Get Rebed from SWRebellion. Goto edit and increase reserch values to 60/50, they start at 40/50. You can also lower cost values for most everything. The idea is to make it easier if you are new or harder if you are an expert. Try winning with the Empire on the hardest level after you jack up the rebels stats.

[BLAM!]

Heyho!

To speed your Researches there is another easy Way...without using Rebed or Research by Chars!

Easy!

You need to build alot of the Structures like the Factorys and Shipyards...i mean really alot!
And you need to build/change as fast as you can the new Updates from a Building!

I start a game and build 40-50 Factory Units on Planets...56-74 Shipyards...that will Speed up your Researches too...more than your Chars on Research...you will finish all Researches until Day 600-700!

of course you can build more to speed up...its your choice if you want so many building and the work you need to build them all!

[ReoHays]

Any MP game I have played, you dont have time to build that many buildings. By turn 100 you need to be ready to win the game or defend against the onslaught.

[Russian Orthodox Revolution]

By the way, I did some A/B testing and found that pairing researchers is the best. Don't do it with all three though, it's still better to keep the last guy on his own.