ICREA is governed by a board chaired by the Minister of Business and Knowledge of our government. To ensure full integration within the Catalan system, the board includes representatives from universities and research centres. Legally, ICREA is a non profit foundation created in 2001, but that is not particularly relevant: legal structure is just a means to achieve the combination of government support and independence of action that has proved to be the key to the success of ICREA.

As for the day-to-day business, ICREA is run in a very straightforward manner and has a very simple structure. Essentially, seven people do all the executive work, and the rest are all researchers (including the Director).