Stephen Johnston is co-founder of Aging2.0 a global innovation platform for aging and senior care. He is also CEO of Fordcastle, an innovation consultancy, and a member of the Future Agenda, the world’s largest open foresight initiative. Co-author of Growth Champions (Wiley, 2012), a book about sustainable corporate growth, Johnston is a leading thinker on the application of new technologies and was previously Senior Manager in Business Development for Nokia where he led corporate strategy programs to identify new areas of growth.
Stephen Johnston founded Aging2.0 in 2012 along with Katy Fike, to support innovators taking on the biggest challenges and opportunities in aging. The organization is international, interdisciplinary and intergenerational, focused on changing the conversation from 1.0 (focused on local, clinical, siloed approaches) to 2.0 (collaborative, lifestyle oriented, opportunity driven). Over the past four years, Aging2.0 has hosted more than 300 events around the world and relies on more than 50 volunteer chapters to build and connect their 15,000-person community in more than 20 countries. Run by a small, dedicated, mission-driven team based in San Francisco, they have 150+ corporate Alliance members and work with CEOs, Chief Elder Officers, who help them design with, not for, older people. Last year, Aging2.0 produced a report on the state of global innovation in aging and senior care with support provided by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Entitled Global Innovations | Local Benefits, the report systematically looked at innovations and innovators from across their global network, with a view to distilling trends, lessons and best practices that could be used to help the U.S. healthcare system.
Stephen Johnston has an MA in Economics from Cambridge University and an MBA from Harvard Business School where he was a Fulbright Scholar. He serves on the board of Music & Memory, a New York 501c3 nonprofit focused on improving the quality of life for older people.