Harri Paananen Director, Economic Development  City of Espoo Harri Paananen is Director in charge of the Economic Development and Employment Unit of Finland’s second largest city Espoo, responsible for supporting the growth of companies and creation of private sector jobs.

Harri also chairs the management group of HEVinnovations, a platform which strengthens innovative activity and boosts innovation-based entrepreneurship in the Finnish Capital Region and is a member of the board of Smart City Innovation Cluster, which combines the actions, expertise and possibilities of both leading technology and infrastructure companies as well as universities and research institutions to create solutions for global scaling. Harri has a background both in innovation management research as well as private sector work, ranging from management consulting and business development to marketing and sales in Finland as well as internationally. Coming from a family of entrepreneurs, he’s naturally also dabbled in startups. Growing up Harri played a lot of Sim City and Civilization, so working in urban development is definitely a dream come true for him!