Earlier this year, our CEO Johnny Högberg visited Milan together with the Mälardal Council, where they witnessed examples of how the city and region have worked with successful innovation areas such as the Milano Innovation District (MIND) and other industrial clusters. Subsequently, on April 26th, the Mälardal Council’s triple helix network, the Greater Stockholm Network, held its networking meeting at Innovation Station Flemingsberg. It was an opportunity to discuss the lessons learned from the trip to Milan and the network’s ongoing work to strengthen the Stockholm-Mälaren region. Johnny Högberg shares his insights.
How was the trip to Milan?
– It was intense and rewarding days. It was exciting to see the urban transformation that has taken place, and I bring many of these impressions with me to Sweden’s largest urban development project in Flemingsberg. Ambassador Jan Björklund provided us with an excellent introduction to Italy, and the full day at MIND, the Milano Innovation District, which is now being developed, created both contacts and new ideas, but also a pride in what has already been built at Campus Flemingsberg in terms of collaboration between academia, research, business, and society, says Johnny Högberg.
What insights has the trip given you?
– Ideas and innovations develop through encounters between people. Here, the dense city is unparalleled, and we at the Flemingsberg Science Foundation have been tasked by our clients in politics and academia to build a city. Not a research facility far away, but to enable research environments, entrepreneurs, and support housing construction so that Flemingsberg continues to grow organically around our strong institutions such as Karolinska Institutet, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, and Södertörn University. By 2050, Flemingsberg is expected to have 50,000 working, 50,000 residents, and 50,000 visitors, concludes Johnny Högberg, CEO of the Flemingsberg Science Foundation.
Read more about the trip and the meeting at Innovation Station here
