The speakers

Ellen Grahn is a certified innovation strategists at Umeå Municipality, supporting the city’s transition and innovation efforts. Umeå, in one of Europe’s fastest-growing regions, is known for its progressive outlook and strong cooperation between universities, public, and private sectors. Ellens work spans strategic, tactical, and operational levels across various sustainability aspects.

Rebecka is a certified innovation strategists at Umeå Municipality, supporting the city’s transition and innovation efforts. Umeå, in one of Europe’s fastest-growing regions, is known for its progressive outlook and strong cooperation between universities, public, and private sectors. Rebeckas work spans strategic, tactical, and operational levels across various sustainability aspects.

Kristina, a self-described trust capitalist, is an expert in building and leveraging trust as a critical asset for organizational success. She is also the author of the book “Trust. The company’s most important capital,” which she will discuss further during Food for Thought.

Could autonomous vehicles, general-purpose robots, and renewable materials converge and together lead to a recalibration of our global society, and replace the current linear economic incentive with a circular instead? And could a shift from ownership to usership (of physical products) lead to a massive reshoring effect for manufacturing back to high-wage countries? During his…

Jonas Boutani Werner is the co-founder of Massvis and Fantastic Studios, a consultancy focused on innovation, organizational transformation, and strategic learning—simply put, making people smarter together. With over 15 years of consulting experience, Jonas has collaborated with private, public, and civil society organizations worldwide, including Greenpeace International, Swedish government entities, and various creative agencies. His…

Designer and public educator, Sara is a well-known and highly regarded voice in the public sector, particularly in promoting and scaling service design.

Architect, and co-founder member of Urban Front, a transnational consultancy. He is also part of the interdisciplinary team responsible for the ATRI.city strategy, which provides cities with tactical housing systems against gentrification and which is currently developing the WikiHousing initiative for the Barcelona City Council. He has been an advisor of the Mayor of Barcelona…

Co-founder of Straddle3, a multidisciplinary collective that works in open source urban projects such as the transformation of vacant urban lots into community spaces, social housing built out of recycled and renewable materials, public parks co-designed and built with their future users, participatory cultural centers in Spain and Latin America or free software tools for…

Cars, boats, buses, and now trucks. This is how Anders Östlund has electrified the transport sector step by step during his almost 17 years as the CEO of Öresundskraft. But it’s not just the technology that stands out – it’s how Anders makes the complex seem simple. With an unfailing ability to lower barriers and help…

Louise is a theologian with two decades of leadership experience across diverse sectors. A recognised national expert in digitalisation and AI applications, and passionate about how these technologies can shape society. Louise is also an experienced producer and moderator of conferences and discussions on these critical topics, making her a sought-after thought leader. In 2022,…

A systems, design, innovation, digital, smart cities and engagement strategist with more than 30 years’ experience in delivering cross-sector, transformational projects, from cities and government to major utilities, private and not-for-profit sectors in the UK, Europe and USA. Recent work includes advising cities across Europe as part of NetZeroCities supporting the EU’s Mission, strategy, engagement…

An international city and systems strategist, with over 30 years’ experience in governance, urban smart tech, digital and data innovation, climate neutrality, sustainability at project development, city, regional and national scale. Major projects include advising cities in NetZeroCities, strategy engagement, innovation and thought leadership with the Scottish Government, EIT Urban Mobility, Scottish AI Alliance, the…

Have you ever wondered how we could truly make the energy transition happen? That is what drives Anna Hall every day. With a focus on uniting academia, industry, governments, and the public sector to make things happen—here and now. How do we drive real progress in energy efficiency? One thing is certain: partnerships across sectors…

Olena Pavlyuk, the Director of the Lviv Bureau of European Integration, has considerable experience in international projects and collaborations. She served as the Director of Lviv Open Lab from 2018 to 2023, a youth center for science popularization in Lviv. Her educational background includes a Master of Management of Non-Profit Organization from Ukrainian Catholic University,…

Karl is the CEO and co-founder of FUZED. Awarded at the Swedish Sports Gala for their work to turn gaming into a catalyst for physical activity, FUZED believes gaming can become a tool for social impact and wellbeing for millions of kids around the world. According to new studies 93% of all kids are gamers,…

Martin Svensson is the Managing Director of AI Sweden, with a mission to accelerate the use of AI for societal benefit and competitiveness - improving life for everyone in Sweden.

With a deep interest in solving social challenges, Karin transformed her career from working in service and business design to specializing in public sector innovation. Driven by a quest to understand how innovation happens, she believes that true change emerges from adopting a systemic approach, integrating diverse perspectives, and fostering collaboration across sectors. Karin leads…

How can we accelerate Net Zero? Katherine Radeka will share insight into just this. She is the founder and CEO of Rapid Learning Cycles, a framework that accelerates technology development and implementation. She supports a global network of Rapid Learning Cycles Certified® Professionals. Bringing expertise in alternative energy, climate change mitigation, and public health industries…

Unfortunately Stefan has fallen ill and will not attend the Summit as speaker. For accurate and updated program, please visit Event Programme Can Doughnut Economics help municipalities navigate the complex area of sustainability? Municipalities must help reduce climate impact and the effects of climate change while creating good conditions for all residents’ quality of life…

What futures do we face and how does it feel to live there? How will we live, work, and consume in the realms of food, fashion, cities, and economies? And how might we create the future we want to be in? As Head of Advisory at Planethon and Futures Strategist, these are the questions Fredrika…

Sofia Strid is an Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology and Work Science at the University of Gothenburg. A distinguished researcher, her work focuses on gender studies and social inequalities. She examines the complexities of gender-based and socio-political mechanisms that perpetuate inequality and observes how these can affect transition pathways. With numerous publications and…

How can we make it easier for startups to secure their first major customers, foster innovation, and grow their businesses for a sustainable society? Stina is an entrepreneur at heart, and have founded several startups and scaled scaleups internationally. In 2017, she was one of the founders of Ignite Sweden, a national non-profit with the…

How can we overcome systemic barriers to empower change and foster innovation in protecting and empowering vulnerable children?  Civil society is transforming with new funding models, partnerships, and cutting-edge tools emerging to lead social change. Yet, empowering change and fostering innovation remains challenging, often due to entrenched system barriers – the “dark matter” of social…

How can we adapt for a sustainable future? Join this leading voice on navigating complexity, leading the sustainability transformation, and the importance of inner development as the driver for social change.

How can we drive sustainability-driven innovation that both benefits humans and the planet? Fernanda Torre is a leading expert in sustainability-driven innovation and the CEO of Next Agents, with their mission to integrate design, business, and innovation to deliver lasting value for both people and the planet. She specialises in innovation management, accelerating the development…

Putting purpose first! Intertwining the efforts and actions around a clear purpose can create flourishing, sustainable businesses. Is it possible to make this process circular and regenerative, evolving into a never-ending loop of real value, cash flow, and economic growth that benefits everyone? That’s precisely what is being explored at FundForward, reimagining circular and impact…

Brita Staal has been in the impact business for a while, and is an advocate for realistic outlooks on the business as unusual we will need for a livable planet.

Technological innovation and institutional change are reshaping the landscape of modern business and society. We must explore two pivotal questions: A. How can we effectively integrate technological advancements into existing frameworks in cities? B. What strategies drive sustainable institutional transformation and the green cities of tomorrow? Dr. Christofer Laurell is in the forefront of these…

The Circular Economy (CE) promises us to maintain or even develop our current lifestyle with the use of less resources and energy – together with a lower climate impact. Therefore, we need answers to at least two central and critical questions: A. Can CE deliver on promises? B. If yes, how do we go from…

AI, robotics and IoT are transforming everything, unlocking new opportunities and challenges. We live in a thrilling era of constant hyper-change, sometimes referred to as Society 5.0 – the 5th industrial revolution. But are we prepared to embrace this exhilarating future? Being the CEO and Futurist at Superlab, Niklas Madsen combines AI, design and innovation…

What happens when technology and social transformation become integrated, how can we ensure people are leading the change?

How do new methods of analyzing data give a head start to sustainable market-ready solutions in urban planning?

Why it is so hard for innovations to justify their impact in the now? What happens if we remove the strings on having to deliver right here and right now?

How can we create a unified European mission to empower all societal actors to leverage resources for a net-zero Europe?