The Vice-Chancellor's full message is below.

Dear colleagues,

Today our 2024 Annual Report (pdf, 2.8MB), including our 2024 financial results, will be tabled in the NSW Parliament.

Financial results

We reported an overall surplus of $545 million – a strong result in an uncertain year. Philanthropic funding, which often comes with restrictions on how it can be spent, and an exceptional 15 percent return on our investments drove this headline result. 

Our core activities of teaching and research, however, again recorded a loss and our 2024 underlying operating result was a deficit of $69 million. 

Every dollar of our surplus is reinvested in teaching, research and making Sydney a better place to work and study. In 2024 we spent $239 million of our investment income to support these core activities. 

Investing in our core mission

We achieved much of note in 2024 by investing in both long-term initiatives to realise our strategic aspirations for the next decade and continuing to deliver initiatives that bring immediate benefit for our students, staff and the community.  

The progress we made on the $780 million Sydney Biomedical Accelerator (SBA) in 2024 meant we could break ground and officially commence construction on this project earlier this month. The SBA will bring together the brightest scientific and clinical minds with entrepreneurs, industry and government and provide the infrastructure to take a major step forward in finding solutions to our biggest health challenges. 

We exceeded our enrolment targets for our MySydney scholarships and earned global recognition for our innovative use of AI in education. We invested in simplifying our research lifecycle and rolled out the first iterations of myResearch Sydney, making research administration easier so we can spend more time solving the world’s grand challenges. 

We also welcomed some of the most promising early and mid-career researchers tackling climate change, health, and sustainability in the first cohort of our Sydney Horizon Fellows – a $100 million investment in the future of academia. And we provided more opportunities for the University leaders of tomorrow through new training programs as part of the Leadership Academy. 

Partnering for good

These accomplishments have been made possible through the efforts of colleagues across the University to strengthen our connections with our alumni, industry and the broader community. We’ve seen unprecedented levels of support and philanthropy which have contributed to our financial results. 

These supporters continue to be one of our greatest strengths as they champion our mission of leadership for good and generously support initiatives that drive innovation, equity and excellence. Likewise, our engagement with industry and community partners has deepened, creating new opportunities for collaboration, innovation and research impact, and to enhance the student experience. 

We’ve achieved much to be proud of together, and the recent re-election of the Federal Government provides us with a degree of stability and new opportunities to contribute to the public good in partnership with government, industry, and our communities. Nevertheless, universities continue to operate in a challenging financial environment with considerable ongoing scrutiny, expanding regulation – including the potential cap on international student enrolments – and constrained government funding for education and research.  

Our long-standing commitment to responsible and prudent financial management has put us in good stead to manage these ongoing challenges.  

My thanks to you all for your continued hard work and dedication. 

Kind regards, 
Mark

Professor Mark Scott 
Vice-Chancellor and President