Thousands of young Australian women will get a boost to their careers courtesy of a $100million gift from one of Australia’s newest billionaires.
Founder of cloud computing infrastructure giant AirTrunk, Robin Khuda, 44, has given the University of Sydney its largest ever donation to fund the 20-year program.
It will create a pathway for girls from Western Sydney to pursue a career in the science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields.
Mr Khuda lived in Western Sydney when he first moved to Australia from Bangladesh, and he opened his first data centre there in 2017.
AirTrunk has grown since its founding nine years ago to become the largest data warehouse provider in the Asia Pacific region.
It was bought by asset management firm Blackstone in September last year for $24billion in a sale that also netted Mr Khuda $500million in cash. He stayed on as CEO in the company where he retains a stake worth of about the same value.
Mr Kudha said while growing AirTrunk he found it challenging to find women with suitable experience for technical and senior management roles, and that those who did study STEM subjects often did not end up in careers in those fields.
‘The Khuda Family Foundation STEM Program will establish an invaluable cohort effect – creating a community and, in time, STEM alumni and leaders that will give girls the resources, role models and mentors to empower their success,’ he said.
Robin Khuda (pictured) sold AirTrunk last year in a deal that made him an instant billionaire. The 44-year-old moved from Bangladesh to Australia to pursue a university education
Mr Khuda said he chose to work with the University of Sydney because of a shared commitment to contributing to the growth of Western Sydney and the need to address gender inequality.
According to a Department of Industry, Science and Resources report released in August last year, the gap between women’s and men’s pay in STEM industries sat at 16 per cent in 2023, a slight improvement from 17 per cent in 2022.
Only 37 per cent of university STEM enrolments are from women, who represent 15 per cent of all people working in STEM jobs.
The research for the report followed a cohort of STEM university graduates from 2011 which showed that 31 per cent of those women ended up working in STEM occupations in 2021 compared to 56 per cent of men.
Meanwhile, girls continue to make up only one quarter of Year 12 enrolments in information technology, physics and engineering subjects.
‘This is a long-term program, and its benefits will multiply over time,’ Mr Khuda said.
‘I want to give back and make a long term positive societal impact because of my belief in the importance of diversity in STEM.’
Anandikaa Ramesh – a third-year Bachelor of Engineering Hons (software engineering) and Bachelor of Commerce student from Western Sydney – said the visibility of women in STEM fields would make a difference.
Mr Khuda is pictured with undergraduate STEM students at the University of Sydney (L-R) Loretta Payne, Anandikaa Ramesh and Samantha Jap
‘In my coding classes at University, women are still definitely in the minority. It’s about young girls who want to participate in STEM having their opinions and perspectives welcomed and respected,’ she said.
‘The earlier girls have their interest in STEM ignited and supported through this kind of program the better. I’m from Western Sydney and there is a definite need for this.’
Mr Khuda said he instigated a push to find and hire more talented women in AirTrunk four years ago, with about 38 per cent of its workforce now female.
He retains a five per cent stake in AirTrunk, which has rapidly grown thanks to the boom in cloud computing and AI backed by giants like Google and Amazon – which Mr Khuda envisioned a decade ago.
The entrepreneur moved from Bangladesh to Australia at the age of 18 to study at university and gained a bachelor of business in accounting and finance from University of Technology, Sydney.
He went on to study at Harvard Business School before he scored jobs in senior roles for Fujitsu, Pipe Networks and NextDC.
He founded AirTrunk in 2015 with the belief data centres could be built quickly and to scale and they would be snapped up by expanding tech companies.
By 2016 he was dipping into his super and asking for insolvency advice from his lawyer after he secured a contract to build a data centre yet found it difficult to bring on investors who baulked at the gamble.
But eventually MrKhuda raised $400million from international firms like Goldman Sachs, and AirTrunk built its first location in Australia in early 2017.
The company now has 11 across Australia, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia and Singapore.
