An institution created for a prospering India

IFMR expands its role as a bridge between academic knowledge and practice, with work spanning public finance, monetary policy, banking, markets and corporate finance. Its executive programmes bring together bankers, executives and civil servants from India and across the Commonwealth, strengthening its engagement with government and industry.

The institute’s research and impact footprint also expands during this period, with specialised centres emerging around new areas of policy and development. The Centre for Micro Finance is established in 2005, followed by the Centre for Development Finance, and Small Enterprise Finance Centre. In 2007, J-PAL South Asia is established at IFMR, strengthening a growing ecosystem connecting rigorous research with policy and development practice.

The institute’s education and research activities expand in scale and scope. The Sri City campus is inaugurated in 2014, while specialised research centres and initiatives deepen IFMR’s engagement with a wider range of development challenges.

A distinctive model begins to take shape: globally connected, but locally anchored. IFMR collaborates with leading academics and research institutions around the world while investing in local research capacity—nurturing Indian researchers and teams to lead projects, build deep contextual knowledge and develop sustained relationships with communities and public institutions.

By 2016, IFMR had grown into a diverse research ecosystem, bringing together specialised institutions and expertise across research, education and practice, with evidence increasingly connected to programme design, policy and systems strengthening.

Building on its experience in research and management education, IFMR enters a new institutional chapter with the establishment of Krea University: a new-age institution conceptualized by eminent academics, business leaders and institution builders, to nurture the next generation of critical thinkers.

J-PAL co-founders Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo, together with Michael Kremer, receive the 2019 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences. IFMR’s early collaboration with the Poverty Action Lab at MIT helps advance research in India that contributes to this wider body of work.

IFMR continues to expand its institutional response as new societal challenges and areas of inquiry emerge. During this period, the Catalyst Atal Incubation Centre is incubated to support entrepreneurship and innovation for social impact. The Institute for What Works to Advance Women and Girls (IWWAGE) is incubated under LEAD in 2018 to advance evidence and action on women’s economic opportunities; the Sapien Labs Centre for Human Brain and Mind is established in 2022; and WELL Labs joins hands with IFMR in 2023, extending its mandate into the water, environment, land and livelihoods sectors.

In 2026, the Deccan Centre for International Relations, IFMR’s ninth centre and first dedicated to international relations is launched, to advance the regions geopolitical agenda.