The ever evolving paradigm of higher education places universities in a pivotal role within a knowledge based economy, connecting all the aspects residing in and about the society. This model places IoBM in an industrial and business hub of Karachi in a pivotal role to facilitate all the other major constituents like public, private and social bodies and to channel the flow of knowledge, thus magnifying the societal impact created individually by these bodies. IoBM is focusing to leverage upon this central position and strengthen its research profile in order to maximize its research outcomes to serve the society at large.

The role of research in creating societal impact in the improvement of quality of life and problem-solving cannot be underestimated. Hence, IoBM puts substantial efforts to improve the quality of its research by investing in its human resources, creating an environment conducive to research and learning, and fostering applied research and innovation. IoBM has defined its research policy to address the multi-dimensional societal issues with the help of its diverse research capabilities. IoBM has also devised a research framework to align its research internally, map the research profile with national needs and global SDGs implementation. All the decisions relating to research, distribution of funds, and resources are taken in the light of these national and global needs.

In the above mentioned perspective, IoBM has identified two key objectives for its research:

• Leveraging its research capital to find innovative and low-cost solutions to diverse societal challenges.
• Transfer of technological and intellectual capital, emerging in the course of research to the public and private enterprises to serve the societal and national purpose.   
• The aim is to establish prolific partnerships with other academic institutions, public and private sectors in the light of such an effort and look for effective solutions for the problems of the society with the help of such linkages. Certain KPIs have been defined to measure the performance of research and the outcomes of research are monitored and evaluated against these KPIs, ascertaining to maximize the societal impact of IoBM research.

In order to leverage fully upon IoBM capabilities, it has defined following 6 Research Themes, and 48 Research Areas which have been divided around IoBM research profile, national and global needs.