Åsa Isacson is an architect, developer and project manager focused on digitisation in relation to the SDG's. She has eight years experience of the UN system - primarily the United Nations Human Settlements Programme in Nairobi. 

 

At UN-Habitat she worked with implementing new online tools for the agency’s strategic partnerships, which helped grow the partner base of uni.unhabitat.org to over 200 universities globally. She was also part of the agency's relaunch team for the new UN-Habitat website, YouTube, and other social media channels.

 

Inspired by the number of high profile experts engaged by the UN she proposed and implemented the Global Urban Lecture video series, recording these experts in openly shared clips. It became the most viewed videos of UN-Habitat, released 5 seasons and is currently viewed in 65 countries. 

 

For her work with the UN she was a finalist as ‘Innovator of the year’ in the 2018 Tech Playmaker Awards in London, an event hosted by Randi Zuckerberg and featured in the Financial Times. The motivation was “A female leader who has driven innovation in her company or organisation specifically through the use of new technology (or) has used technology to drive positive organisational change.” 

 

She has been organizer and held numerous speaking arrangements in several international high profile events, including the World Urban Forum 6 in Italy (2012), the World Urban Forum 7 in Colombia (2014), and the World Expo in Shanghai (2010).

 

She's worked for a couple of years as a developer within the private sector but her heart lays with upgrading the tools of the public sector. Since 2019 she's been focusing solely on projects which positively impact the SDG's, primarily through Egnahemsfabriken (which just won 'Cooperative of the Year', yay!). She's the co-founder of Bygden and board member and lead tech innovator for Liminal Space.