What challenges did University of Sydney face before AI implementation?

Needed to scale personalized academic and administrative support for thousands of students. Staff and students found navigating extensive academic and policy documentation time-consuming. Manual workload for educators hindered productivity across hundreds of courses.

What was the impact of the AI solution?

Over 600 AI agents created since launch. 31,500+ conversations with more than 10,000 users. Cogniti in use across 300+ units of study (expected to double). Significant productivity gains for educators and personalized feedback for students.

Source

MicrosoftLive sourceProductionEvidence: High75/100

University of Sydney launches AI agents for personalized student and staff support

Use case typeStudent supportUpdated Jun 13, 2026

The University of Sydney has developed 'Cogniti', an Azure-based AI assistant platform, to provide scalable academic and administrative support to its students and staff. Educators can create their own AI chatbot agents linked to specific course materials, enabling personalized interaction for thousands of students directly within the learning management system. Staff use a generative AI policy navigator also powered by Microsoft's Information Assistant accelerator to quickly access over 360 staff policies, improving operational efficiency. The solution demonstrates significant uptake across hundreds of units, thousands of conversations, and international collaboration with other universities.

Organization: University of Sydney
Industry: Education
Location: Australia
Published: June 2024

Reported outcomes

Strategic outcomes

Scale & capacityScaled personalized student and staff supportNew product / capabilityCreated customizable AI chatbot platformNew product / capabilityDeployed AI policy navigatorBetter decisions & insightImproved operational efficiency and feedback

Why do we believe this deployment?Customer identity, provider attribution, maturity, and source checks

Customer: University of Sydney
Provider: Microsoft
Maturity: Production
Linked source: news.microsoft.com

Staff use a generative AI policy navigator also powered by Microsoft's Information Assistant accelerator to quickly access over 360 staff policies, improving operational efficiency

Customer identity supportedSource describes one deploymentMaturity supported

Primary read

Use case focus

Showing 2 of 2

1Personalized Academic Support with AI Chatbot Agents
2Automated Staff Policy Navigation and Assistance

Needed to scale personalized academic and administrative support for thousands of students.
Staff and students found navigating extensive academic and policy documentation time-consuming.
Manual workload for educators hindered productivity across hundreds of courses.

Developed Cogniti, an Azure-based platform for educators to create custom AI chatbot agents embedded in LMS.
Deployed an AI policy navigator using Microsoft’s Information Assistant accelerator for fast access to staff policies.
Provided seamless, university-managed AI support, with real-time feedback options and analytics.

Technologies

Azure AI Azure OpenAI Information Assistant Accelerator

Over 600 AI agents created since launch.
31,500+ conversations with more than 10,000 users.
Cogniti in use across 300+ units of study (expected to double).
Significant productivity gains for educators and personalized feedback for students.

Architecture

Azure-based Cogniti platform allows creation of custom AI agents for students and staff, embedded in the LMS. AI policy navigator, built using the Information Assistant accelerator, provides quick access to staff policies. Both tools leverage Azure AI analytics and security controls.

Sources & evidence2

Evidence: High75/100Evidence strength