What you are telling is that any product development cycle involves a lot of measurements… Man, that’s obvious.. And no different for mains manufacturers, Titan audio for example develops cables with University of Belfast:
In a collaboration project in partner with the esteemed Queens University, we sent out to fully investigate the facts surrounding power conditioning and the need for better mains technology to be utilised within HiFi systems.
titanaudio.co.uk
And lots of relevant measurements done as for all the equipment. But it’s human ears (and brains) to ultimately decide in the end whether you recorded your sound with the most precise microphones or not..