Take Windows desktop. It's designed to run at scale, out the box, when you have 10 000 employees, and any hardware, printers, whatever. A govt isn't buying Windows its buying active directory, and the fact that every new hire knows how to use it already. And a million other things windows does at scale (technically and humanally).

Funding developers is a risk as to weather the results will be what you hope. Paying for software is actually paying rent on something already complete. A typical software company uses the rent they collect on prior work to fund the newer risky work. The big companies are mostly doing the rent thing to pay shareholders.