Krea University, located in Sri City, Andhra Pradesh, has launched the Centre for Entrepreneurship (CfE) to strengthen its focus on innovation, entrepreneurship and venture creation, with a specific emphasis on supporting student founders building impact-driven ventures.
The Centre will be supported by Catalyst, the existing accelerator incubated at IFMR, with backing from NITI Aayog and the Atal Innovation Mission. The initiative is designed to prepare all Krea students to think entrepreneurially, while providing structured support to those pursuing venture creation.
Established with support from Mithun Sacheti, founder of CaratLane, the Centre was inaugurated during a day-long event at the Krea University campus. The event brought together founders, investors and ecosystem leaders from across India’s startup landscape to discuss building, scaling and sustaining ventures in a rapidly evolving market.
Sharing insights from his entrepreneurial journey, Sacheti said:
“Building something meaningful requires ambition but it also requires clarity, patience and realistic grit. Additionally, the founders need to have the courage to go ahead and be ready to do the hard grind whenever you are starting to build.”
The launch event also featured participation from Mahavir Sharma, Vishesh Rajaram, Manish Saksena, Sujay S. and Innu Nevatia, Vipul Sekhsaria, Amit Mehta, Anand Sri Ganesh of NSRCEL IIM Bangalore, and Kapil Viswanathan.
Speaking at the launch, Nirmala Rao said Krea aims to nurture an entrepreneurial mindset across its student community.
“Krea’s students are agile and willing to meaningfully engage with grand challenges, which underpins entrepreneurial success. With its interwoven liberal education and the Business School and Research centres under one roof, the Krea ecosystem has a unique opportunity to create entrepreneurial leaders.”
Lakshmi Narayanan highlighted the role of entrepreneurship in shaping future-ready leaders, noting that learning, curiosity, courage and values are central to building with purpose at Krea. Narayanan previously served as CEO of Cognizant.
The Centre for Entrepreneurship is envisioned as a long-term institutional platform to nurture builders and innovators, encouraging students to view entrepreneurship not just as a career choice but as a mindset that can inform leadership across sectors. It will draw on Catalyst’s experience in running national-level innovation programmes while leveraging Krea University’s integrated academic ecosystem.
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