Christian Bason

Author & Advisor

Christian Bason is a leader at the forefront of new approaches to sustainable transitions. As the CEO of the Danish Design Center, Christian has played a pivotal role in strengthening the value of all forms of design in society. Formerly, Christian was Director of MindLab, the Danish government’s innovation team, where he pioneered design for the public sector, and Business Manager with Ramboll, a global advisory group.

Gabriella Gómez-Mont

Founder and CEO of Experimentalista

Founder and CEO of Experimentalista, a novel type of nomadic and creative office specialized in cities – and that constantly shifts shape to accommodate high-level, transdisciplinary collaborations across the world.Former Director of “Laboratorio para la Ciudad” (Mexico).

Sophie Howe

Future Generations Activist

She was the first Future Generations Commissioner for Wales, the only role of its kind in the world. She held Government to account on how their decisions affect future generations and has influenced other countries to follow suit including the UN.

Named as one of the UK’s Top 100 Changemakers and at number 5 in the BBC Women’s Power List.

Geci Karuri-Sebina

Sebina, Adjunct Professor

Geci Karuri-Sebina is a Johannesburg-based scholar-practitioner working on urban planning and governance issues. She is currently an associate of the South African Cities Network, a visiting research fellow with the Wits School of Governance, and a national organizer of the Civic Tech Innovation Network in South Africa. Her interests span a range of development, foresight and policy, innovation and practice topics relating to the intersection between people, place and technological change, focusing on the global south.

Bruce Katz

Author & Co-Founder of New Localism Advisors

Co-founder (with Jeremy Nowak) of New Localism Advisors, whose mission is to help cities design, finance and deliver transformative initiatives that promote inclusive and sustainable growth. Heinz Award in Public Policy in 2006 for his contributions to understanding the “function and values of cities and metropolitan areas and their profound influence on their economic vitality, livability and sustainability”.

He regularly advises global, national, state, regional and municipal leaders on public reforms and private innovations that advance the well-being of metropolitan areas and their countries.

Michael Koh

Executive Fellow, Centre for Liveable Cities

Michael Koh is the Executive Fellow at the Centre for Liveable Cities, Ministry of National Development, Singapore, where he is involved in research, organization of the World Cities Summit and Mayors Forum, capability development and international advisory projects.

Tommi Laitio

Urbanist & Bloomberg Public Innovation Fellow 

Tommi Laitio is an award-winning leader and strategist on cities, partnerships, and public spaces. With over two decades of experience in city leadership and public innovation, he consults organizations that want to turn urban friction into thriving public life and places—and great places to work.

Charles Landry

Author & International Advisor

Charles Landry is an author and international adviser on the future of cities best known for popularising the Creative City concept. His book The Creative City: A Toolkit for Urban Innovators became a movement to rethink the planning, development and management of cities.

Klaus Klaas Loenhart

Founder of terrain: integral designs

Klaus Klaas Loenhart is a passionate eco-innovator, founder of terrain: integral designs, terrain.cloud and Professor at ia&l Landlab TU Graz, Austria. As a multi-disciplinarian, he and his teams envision nature-inspired, impact-focused design solutions for reconnecting urban society with our living world.

David Miller

Managing Director of C40

He is the Managing Director of the C40 Centre for City Climate Policy and Economy. He was Mayor of Toronto from 2003 to 2010 and Chair of C40 Cities from 2008 until 2010. Under his leadership, Toronto became widely admired internationally for its environmental leadership, economic strength, and social integration.

Carlos Moreno

Author & Urbanist

University professor, Carlos Moreno is an international scientific personality. Recognized specialist of the intelligent control of the complex systems, he is also a pioneer in the field of the intelligent cities with his vision of a Human Smart City, a living city, of which he is one of the initiators and the organizers on the world scene.

Farah Naz

Author & Engineer

Head of innovation and ESG for the Middle East and Africa. She is a chartered engineer, award-winning climate change strategist, and co-author of the Middle East region’s first book on net zero cities.

Farah has over 20 years of experience in the built environment, having worked on iconic projects such as the Museum of the Future, Louvre Abu Dhabi, Bee’ah HQ in Sharjah, and the Expo 2020 Sustainability Pavilion.

Larry Ng Lh

Former Managing Director of World Cities Summit

Former Managing Director of the World Cities Summit and Former Prize Secretary of the Lee Kuan Yew World City Prize (Urban Redevelopment Authority), Former Commissioner General of the Singapore Pavilion at the Expo 2020 Dubai UAE.Former Registrar of the Board of Architects of Singapore.

David O’Reilly

Chief Executive Officer at The Howard Hughes Corporation

David O’Reilly is the Chief Executive Officer of Howard Hughes Holdings Inc., responsible for driving the sustainable growth of the company’s assets and unlocking meaningful long-term value across the company’s portfolio. He previously served as the company’s President and as its Chief Financial Officer—the role in which he joined the company in 2016.

Dr. Konyango Charles Otieno

National Director of Urban Development, Kenya

Dr. Konyango Charles Otieno is the National Urban Climate Resilience Champion and focal point for the mobilization for implementing the Building of Climate Resilience for the Urban Poor (BCRUP). He is a distinguished Scholar, Manager, Policy and Technocrat in Urban and Regional Development Planning, Urban Infrastructure & Environment, and Urban Resilience and Climate Change.

Carmen Santana

Architect 

Carmen Santana is an Architect who received the Spanish Urbanism Award 2021. She is a partner of ARCHIKUBIK and co-founder of @kubik multidisciplinary space in 1995. She specializes in urban ecology, sustainability in the Information Society, and the impact of ICTs on urban environments. She is also a teacher and lecturer.

Stephen D. Willacy

Architect & Urban Advisor

Stephen brings a rich and unique set of competencies to the table, combining international experiences as a practicing architect and urbanist, teaching and research and most recently, as a leading civil servant in the Aarhus City Council. Stephen has been a partner in the internationally acclaimed Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects with responsibilities for starting up their offices in London, UK and Shanghai, China; Associate Professor and researcher at Aarhus School of Architecture; Guest Professor at Arizona State University, USA, and is currently as honorary professor at The University of Dundee, Scotland.