In 2009, Strøm-Olsen co-founded the leading Nordic art magazine: KUNSTforum. While writing about culture and city development, he was struck by how startups and artists revive cities in Europe and around the world. He has written three books on business, culture and city development, among them Startup Israel – argument breeds innovation (2017) and Startup Europe, The Entrepreneurs transforming Europe (2016). Together with Maria Amelie, Strøm-Olsen founded the company Startup Migrants in 2018 which aims to map the innovation output from migration to Europe and thereby point to best practice in achieving innovation because of migration.