With a career of over 20 years in technology and built environment in Europe, North America and Asia, Mikele is a recognised leader in urban innovation.
Mikele is the founder and CEO of Urban Living Futures and creator of the UPPlift Urban Pilot Platform, matching global cities and real estate asset operators with smart city innovators and the facilitating deployment and commercialisaton of novel solutions.
Prior to establishing Cognicity, the pioneering smart city technology accelerator, attracting innovators from around the world to make their solutions interoperable and pilot them at Canary Wharf, Mikele helped set up the UK government’s centres of excellence: Future Cities and Energy Systems Catapults.
She is a founding member and the Executive Director of Innovate Cities, a ground-breaking smart city innovation scale up model in Canada; a NED Board member for MIRIS, a highly innovative property company developing energy positive smart communities in Scandinavia; an industry expert assessor for SME funding for several global organisations, and an advisor and mentor to smart city startups.
Previously, Mikele led the Cities sector in General Electric’s Global Growth & Operations team, developing commercial models for alternative energy solutions for cities and urban developments. Prior to joining GE, Mikele led the UK introduction of Building Information Modelling services, promoting collaboration and efficiency in design, construction and lifecycle building portfolio management.
Earlier in her career, as an urban planner, Mikele led property and infrastructure master plans, sustainable development studies and socio-economic impact assessments for new urban areas, regeneration projects and urban infrastructure systems in Asia, Europe and North America.