Online kick-off event on Wednesday 17th February 2021

Update 4.3.2021: The online kick-off event was a success! Thank you to all participants. Please find the recordings and summaries of the kick-off presentations in this blog post.

You are cordially invited to the official launch of our research project Road to Freedom (in Finnish, Tiekartta vapauteen) on Wednesday 17th February 2021 at 2 PM to 3.30 PM (CET time).

The topic of the discussion is what it requires for news media and advertisers to reduce dependence on Silicon Valley tech giants such as Google, Apple and Facebook. We have invited a group of thinkers involved in the ongoing conversation about the power of platforms to share their thoughts.

Keynote Speaker:

• The online kick-off will start with an overview of the media landscape and its relationship with Silicon Valley by Professor Lucy Küng, who is an international expert on mastering digital transformation.

Other speakers:

• Petra Wikström, Director of Public Policy at the Nordic media- and digital consumer brands group Schibsted.
• Alexander Fanta, a Brussels-based journalist at Netzpolitik.org, a German news site that covers digital rights issues.
• Kasper Lindskow, Head of Research and Innovation at Ekstra Bladet, a media brand in JP/Politikens Hus in Copenhagen, Denmark.
• Riikka-Maria Lemminki, Managing Director at Marketing Finland, a network with around 400 companies in the Finnish ad industry.

Comments by:

• Miapetra Kumpula-Natri, Member of the European Parliament representing Finland and the S&D Group since 2014.

The research project Road to freedom is a collaboration between four Finnish universities (Helsinki, Jyväskylä, Tampere and Turku) funded by the Media Industry Research Foundation of Finland. You can find more information on our website.

Registration for the event has ended!

Lucy Küng

Professor Lucy Küng is an international expert on mastering digital transformation. A strategic advisor, board member, speaker and author, she has over twenty years’ experience providing senior-level strategic, leadership and business advice on how to emerge stronger from technological and market disruption.

She consults and speaks with leading companies worldwide including the BBC, CNN, Google, NPR and NRK, and keynotes frequently at conferences including the INMA World Congress, SXSW, FIPP World Congress and the European Broadcasting Union.

She is Board Member of the NZZ Media Group, and served on the board of SRG SSR, and of VIZRT the media tech provider. She is Senior Research Associate at the Reuters Institute, Oxford University and has held professorships at the University of Oslo, the Institute of Media and Entertainment New York (IESE), and the University of Jönköping.

Lucy Küng is the author of several books including Going Digital: A Roadmap for Digital Transformation, Innovators in Digital News, Strategic Management in the Media (winner of the AEMJM Media Management Book Award), Inside the BBC and CNN, and When Innovation Fails to Disrupt, the Case of BBC News Online.

She holds a PhD and Habilitation from the University of St Gallen and an MBA from City Business School/Ashridge. In 2020 she received an Honorary Doctorate in Economics from the University of Neuchatel. In 2017 she won the European Media Management Award in recognition of excellence in media management scholarship. She was Swiss Representative of the EU Cost Action 20 on the Impact of the Internet on the Mass Media in Europe, and Member of the UK Government Taskforce on the Future and Development of Information Relationships.

Her latest book ‘Hearts and Minds: Harnessing Leadership, Culture and Talent to Really Go Digital’ was published in November 2020 by the Reuters Institute, University of Oxford.

Petra Wikström

Petra Wikström is the Director of Public Policy at the Nordic media- and digital consumer brands group Schibsted. Petra has extensive experience in working with policy issues for several Nordic media companies, both as self-employed consultant as well as head of public affairs for the largest commercial broadcasters in Sweden and Finland. She has worked at various media associations both in London and Brussels, and has been a member of the board of the Association of Commercial Television in Europe (ACT). Petra, who has a degree in political sciences, is originally from Finland but is now living in Stockholm with her husband and her two teenaged children.

Kasper Lindskow

Kasper Lindskow is the Head of Research and Innovation at Ekstra Bladet, a media brand in JP/Politikens Hus in Copenhagen (Denmark). In addition, he is a post doc focusing on artificial intelligence in media at Copenhagen Business School and leader of the Platform Intelligence in News project. He has a PhD in strategic design of digital business models from Copenhagen Business School.

Alexander Fanta

Alexander Fanta is a Brussels-based journalist at Netzpolitik.org, a German news site that covers digital rights issues. He writes about technology and digital policy-making in the European Union. Alexander is the co-author of the study “Google, the media patron” (2020) published by the Otto Brenner foundation in Germany. He can be found on Twitter: @FantaAlexx.

Riikka-Maria Lemminki

Riikka-Maria Lemminki is the Managing Director at Marketing Finland, a network of around 400 companies that look after companies’ vital interests in Finland and abroad. Marketing Finland is member of international organizations such as the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA), European Association of Communications Agencies (EACA) and International Communications Consultancy Organisations ICCO.

Miapetra kumpula-natri

Miapetra Kumpula-Natri, Member of the European Parliament representing Finland and the S&D Group since 2014. She is the first vice-chair of the Special Committee on Artificial Intelligence in a Digital Age (AIDA) and commonly  known in the parliament as ”Madame Roaming” and ”Digi-MEP”.