The Shahjehan S Karim Incubation Center at the Institute of Business Management in Karachi welcomed Dr Javaid Laghari, former Chairman of the Higher Education Commission and Chairman of the commission’s National Task Force to Review the Performance and Effectiveness of Business Incubation Centers, together with task force member Dr Eram Abbasi, on July 15, 2026. The delegation’s visit brought the national review of university incubation centers to one of the institutions that run them, giving members of the task force a chance to see the center’s work and speak with the people responsible for it.
During the visit, the delegation met Talib Karim, President of the Institute of Business Management, and engaged with representatives of the Shahjehan S Karim Incubation Center and the institute’s Office of Research, Innovation and Commercialization. The discussions focused on building the institute’s research, innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem, with particular emphasis on the role and effectiveness of business incubation centers. Because the task force exists to judge how well such centers perform, the conversation gave the institute an opportunity to explain how its incubation work connects with its research office and its wider academic activity, and to hear how the review team assesses these links.
The delegation also shared insights and recommendations during the visit. These were followed by an interactive discussion with faculty and representatives of academic departments, which widened the conversation beyond the incubation center itself to include the teachers and departments whose students and research feed into it. Including faculty in the exchange reflects the view that an incubation center works best when it is closely tied to the rest of the university, drawing ideas from research and giving students a route to turn them into businesses. Feedback from a national review panel can help institutions identify where their programs are working and where they need adjustment.
The incubation center thanked the delegation for the visit and for its contributions toward advancing entrepreneurship, innovation and industry and academia collaboration. The Shahjehan S Karim Incubation Center is part of the Institute of Business Management’s effort to encourage students and aspiring entrepreneurs to develop and carry out viable business ideas. With the Higher Education Commission’s task force examining the performance of incubation centers across the country, visits of this kind give both the reviewers and the institutions a direct view of how these centers operate in practice, and they help shape expectations for how universities should support startups in the years ahead.
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