The AI Inflection Point | Ep 2 — The response: AI in the room

Episode 2 of The AI Inflection Point — six conversations recorded at the HEDx 2026 conference in Sydney. The diagnosis is set. Now: what does it actually take to respond?

Lucy Marshall from the University of Sydney names what most leaders know but rarely say out loud — universities don’t have an innovation problem. They have a culture problem. Fear is the barrier. Not budget, not technology. Fear.

Then Aleks Subic, who built an innovation precinct in the heart of Birmingham, and Grant Robertson, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Otago, answer the same question from the outside in — by changing where the university stands in the world, and who it stands for.

If the barrier isn’t technology but culture — what does it actually take to change a university from the inside?