‘We cannot wait 75 years’: ANRF CEO Shivkumar Kalyanaraman on scaling India’s research multiplier

The Anusandhan National Research Foundation, or ANRF, is India’s national institution for strengthening research and innovation. Parliament formalised it in 2023 after recommendations in the National Education Policy 2020. It is an autonomous statutory body presided over by the Prime Minister of India.

Its purpose is to link higher education, private industry, venture capital, and global philanthropy. This connection is meant to improve funding flows from foundational research to commercial use. ANRF also aims to make India a global innovation powerhouse and expand excellence beyond a small group of elite institutions.

The foundation is using several tools to pursue that goal. Its Rs 1 lakh crore fund supports research-intensive ventures, while Partnerships for Accelerated Innovation and Research spreads mentorship across institutions. Maha programmes target areas such as electric mobility, medical devices, artificial intelligence, drones, and critical minerals.

The Research, Development, and Innovation fund contains Rs 1 lakh crore in government-backed capital. ANRF describes this money as patient capital, intended for research-intensive and deep-tech ventures that may need years before producing returns. The fund is therefore not designed as a quick-disbursement programme demanding immediate results.

The article says the government’s money could catalyse anywhere from Rs 5 to 10 lakh crores by the time it reaches the real economy. That estimate includes private investment attracted through the fund’s structure. The government contribution is intended to serve as a base that encourages much larger flows of capital.

ANRF will also combine public funding with corporate social responsibility grants, diaspora contributions, and global philanthropic partnerships. Its broader financial target is to lift India’s research and development spending from below 1% of GDP to at least 3%, supported by 20% to 25% annual growth.

ANRF’s fund-of-funds model makes government money work as a financial multiplier. Instead of choosing and funding every company directly, the foundation acts as an apex funding architecture. This creates an additional layer between public capital and real-world ventures, while giving specialist managers responsibility for deploying funds.

The initial allocation goes to nineteen selected fund managers and specialised statutory entities. These recipients then attract private investment and direct capital toward research-intensive and deep-tech enterprises. In this way, one government allocation can support a larger pool of funding than the original public contribution alone.

The model is central to ANRF’s estimate that Rs 1 lakh crore could catalyse Rs 5 to 10 lakh crores in the real economy. Corporate social responsibility money, diaspora contributions, and global philanthropy can add further capital. The intended result is faster movement from research funding to market implementation.

Deep-tech companies and research projects often take longer to develop than ordinary businesses. They may need extended gestation periods before laboratory work becomes a tested technology or a commercial product. Funding that demands quick returns can therefore run against the slow, uncertain path from discovery to market.

ANRF’s patient-capital approach is designed around that reality. Its Rs 1 lakh crore fund provides long-term financial support to research-intensive and deep-tech enterprises. The money is channelled through fund managers, who can help ventures continue developing instead of judging them only by immediate revenue or returns.

This approach matters because ANRF wants research to reach the real economy, not remain inside laboratories. The fund’s structure aims to attract private investment while accepting longer timelines. If it works, ventures can receive the runway needed to turn foundational research into products and services.

India wants to raise research and development spending because the article presents stronger research capacity as central to becoming a global innovation powerhouse. Current spending is below 1% of GDP. ANRF’s goal is to reach 3% or more, giving researchers and technology ventures a much larger base of support.

More funding is also meant to address concentration in India’s higher education system. Advanced research has historically been clustered in institutions such as the IITs and IISc. ANRF wants to broaden the distribution of excellence, not simply send money to more places without building strong research capability.

The foundation plans to support this expansion through patient capital, partnerships, and sector-focused Maha programmes. It also aims to grow spending at a compound annual rate of 20% to 25%. Higher investment could help connect foundational research, regional institutions, startups, and practical applications.

Open licensing gives startups a faster route to university research. Instead of treating every discovery as a tightly controlled asset, the approach allows companies to use research under clear, accessible terms. This matters when a startup needs to test an idea quickly and cannot afford long negotiations or uncertainty over intellectual property.

ANRF uses open licensing frameworks derived from the MIT licence model for discoveries from programmes such as artificial intelligence for science. Startups can adopt relevant university research more readily. They can then test and develop it at regional translational test facilities, which help bridge laboratory work and practical use.

The article describes this as a way to de-risk laboratory discoveries and address a major commercialisation bottleneck. Faster access does not guarantee a successful product, but it can shorten the path from research to experimentation and market development. The broader aim is to move more publicly supported science into the real economy.

The article presents the US National Science Foundation and DARPA as institutions whose development followed evolutionary timelines of about 75 years. It does not give a detailed explanation for why those institutions took so long. Its central point is that India cannot afford to copy that pace while trying to build a global innovation powerhouse.

ANRF is described as an institutional startup operating under an impatient Prime Minister. It aims to bypass traditional bureaucratic friction and connect research to the economy faster. Its fund-of-funds model sends public money through nineteen fund managers and statutory entities, helping attract private capital rather than relying only on direct government grants.

The faster approach also combines open licensing with targeted Maha programmes and research partnerships. These tools are intended to shorten the distance between discovery and commercial use. ANRF’s model is therefore designed for speed and scale, while still supporting long-term research through patient capital.