Maybe i'm cynical but my impression is that most productless companies with lots of storytelling around some phd's are almost always about scamming investors / grant money / public funds.

If anyone have great non sensational examples of the opposite i'm all ears.

I remember becoming aware of this during the crypto wave where there was always a bunch of "researchers" with PhD's around paper-thin whitepapers - and these researches were often from very prestigious universities, and of the hundreds of these companies no one produced anything valuable - and i've seen the same thing in many sectors like nutrition, "healthcare", financial products etc.