Vantaggi
In R&D, the environment is fairly laid back. Dress is casual and no one is micro-managing your hours. The instruments we work on are cutting edge and so are the technologies (for the most part). There is still maintenance on some legacy instruments that requires old development systems to be fired up here and there, but for the most part things are moving forward. C#, C++, VS 2013, TFS 2013, etc. Great place to sharpen your design and programming skills!
Svantaggi
The software engineering group has become top heavy, and there is not a lot of room for advancement. Can be here 15 years before getting promoted to next level. Also, management will not hesitate to hire from the outside right into higher level positions, when there are people internally who could fill the roles.