Hasse has worked with technical products and development his entire life. The city of Åmål was the site of his first company, Mecel. Saab was showing an interest in a new type of ignition system Hasse had developed, and when Pelle Gillbrand from Saab approached Hasse and asked him to do something with the system, he took the bull by the horns, convinced Saab to invest in a development project, and founded Mecel. Over the next four to five years, portions of the company were sold to Saab Automobile. Hasse ran Mecel for another twenty years before becoming the European representative for electronics development at Delphi in the 1990s. About ten years later, he moved to Scania as Head of Research and Development. Something that struck him at Scania was the corporate management's enormous involvement and interest in the product. This is Scania's secret of success, Hasse thinks. 

This brings us into the issue of expertise and passion for technology in Sweden. Hasse believes that it is enormously important that we keep the automotive sector in Sweden. To be able to do that, we have to have an educational system that turns out the best engineers in the world. Lindholmen is perfect for this. At Lindholmen, engineers are trained in close collaboration with industry, which is something that must be even further developed in Sweden, Hasse believes. Industry has to open up more and become much more involved to get kids interested in technology right from an early age - get out there, keep the schools informed on what's going on, invite families and class groups to visit the companies, etc. Lindholmen brings together 9000 students and 9000 professionals every day. This mix is invaluable, Hasse believes. There are 273 companies and a number of high schools in the area. The aim is to have a daily circulation at Lindholmen of 30,000 people and to bring in another 20 companies with a combined total of 1,000 employees.

In the bottom floor of "The Cog" - the new building in the middle of Lindholmen - plans are now taking shape on a sort of workshop where visitors can learn about technology, play games and test products. The aim is to interest young people in pursuing technical degrees or careers in industry by showing that technology is exciting, experimental and offers good future prospects for today's youth.

An environment like Lindholmen encourages openness for companies and students alike. It is a cultivation ground for joint research projects and new forms of collaboration. This is the wave of the future, according to Hasse. Patents are losing significance and companies will need to open up much more to remain competitive. And to attract the best talent.