HKUST Annual Report 2024-2025

4 HKUST ANNUAL REPORT 2024-25 Building on our global standing and diverse partnerships, HKUST continued to expand in other strategic areas over 2024-25. At the newly launched Hong Kong Space Robotics and Energy Center—our fifth research center under the HKSAR Government’s InnoHK initiative—our researchers are collaborating with institutions globally to develop the Hong Kong Operation Robot for the Chang’E-8 lunar mission, targeted for launch in 2029. In another forward-looking venture, the University’s Low Altitude Economy Research Center is fostering academic-industry-government collaborations to power up this potential trillion-dollar emerging market. The Center supported the establishment of a low-altitude economy regulatory sandbox by the HKSAR Government for trialing new applications. I was honored to welcome HKSAR Chief Executive Mr. John LEE Ka-Chiu to HKUST for the launch and delighted to see our researchers’ innovations included among the first “smart sky” projects. In this Foreword, I wish to highlight key developments over the past year that reflect our ongoing commitment to positioning Hong Kong as an international hub for innovation and technology, and to contributing to national strategies in education, science and technology, and sustainable development. Among our most significant institutional advances was the approval of our detailed proposal to establish Hong Kong’s third medical school. We deeply appreciate the trust placed in HKUST by the HKSAR Government’s Task Group on New Medical School. With developing a future-ready biomedical and healthcare ecosystem central to our strategy, we look forward to advancing the city’s healthcare system through the HKUST School of Medicine (SMED). Leveraging our scientific and technological strengths—ranked 17th globally in data science and AI*—we will train a new generation of tech-savvy clinicians, in partnership with government, industry, and the city’s two established medical schools. Demonstrating early momentum, HKUST has secured nearly 40 agreements with leading medical institutions across Hong Kong, the Greater Bay Area, the Yangtze River Delta, and other parts of the Chinese Mainland, as well as in the UK, the US, and Europe. * QS World University Ranking by Subject 2025