The agricultural sector has historically seen stable prices and a relatively constant demand for its products. Companies within the sector have generally had few loans and large sums of money tied in assets. The profitability of the companies has on the other hand been low. Together these circumstances have determined the creditors? demands on the companies within the sector and have formed the rules and regulations that exist today.

Human Resource Management (HRM) consultants are becoming more common. Simultaneously there is a lack of HRM in small and medium enterprises (SME?s). SME?s states neither to afford, nor have the time to perform HRM in their business.This thesis is a Working Scholarly essay based on qualitative method, based on ten semi- structured interviews.

Inom Business Intelligence har begreppet Self-Service Business Intelligence (Self-Service BI) vuxit fram. Self-Service BI omfattar verktyg vilka möjliggör för slutanvändare att göra analyser och skapa rapporter utan teknisk support. Ett av dessa verktyg är Microsoft PowerPivot.På Transportstyrelsens Järnvägsavdelning finns behov av ett Self-Service BI-verktyg. Vi fick i uppdrag av Sogeti att undersöka om PowerPivot var ett lämpligt verktyg för Transportstyrelsen. Målet med uppsatsen har varit att testa vilka tekniska möjligheter och begränsningar PowerPivot har samt huruvida PowerPivot är användbart för Transportstyrelsen.För att få en djupare förståelse för Self-Service BI har vi kartlagt vilka möjligheter och begränsningar med Self-Service BI-verktyg som finns beskrivna i litteraturen.

Foreign invested SMEs have recently become increasingly interested in China. The enterprises are in this report categorized as second wave companies since they follow the footsteps of previous pioneers, of which mostly were larger companies. The ambitions of the SMEs are either to sell products on the ever expanding Chinese market or to utilize the potential of low cost production for global markets. The existing literature is fragmented and solely based on the experience of larger companies. We believe that SMEs are facing new and different challenges, and thus a new generic theoretical frame work is desirable.

Genom en enkätundersökning till konsumenter har vi kommit fram till att det är lägre kostnader, bättre information och bättre täckning som är de optimala faktorerna för 3G-operatörerna att kunna locka till sig fler konsumenter. .

Bakgrund: Kunders inköpsprocess skiljer sig mellan industriella marknader och konsumentmarknader. När organisationer gör inköp handlar det ofta om stora belopp och komplexa produkter. Relationen mellan det köpande och det säljande företaget brukar vara tätare än vid vanliga konsumentinköp. För att den säljande organisationen ska förstå hurde mest effektivt ska erhålla kunder är det nödvändigt att identifiera de olika faserna i kunders inköpsprocess och undersöka vad som påverkar kundernas beteende vid inköpet. Syfte: Vårt syfte med denna uppsats är att beskriva hur SMHIs kunders beslutsprocess ser ut vid inköp och vilka faktorer som påverkar denna process.

Socially Responsible Investments (SRI) and Active Ownership have become increasingly important concepts when it comes to the corporate governance of investors today. Institutional owners highlight the importance of engaging in dialogue, in their pursuit to influence the companies to become sustainable. However, stakeholders and academia are requesting more insight into the workings of these dialogues, concerning their purpose, design and function. This study attempts to increase the existing knowledge of dialogue as a tool for active engagement, used by institutional investors in Sweden. The performed study is based on interviews with five public and private Swedish institutional investors, an SRI consultant firm as well as representatives from two NGOs.

This thesis has been performed at International Aluminum Casting AB in Eskilstuna,Sweden.International Aluminum Casting is currently working with a number of improvementsin their production in order to achieve their vision of being the leading aluminum foundry in Sweden. As a step in their improvement efforts, focus was directed ondeveloping the company's fixtures for machining.Efforts were focused on two main objectives: to develop a complete proposal on afixture which leads to a more rational use of an assigned part and also form general design advice for development of fixtures in the future.During the work progress, discussions have been made with experts at International Aluminum Casting within the field of fixture design. The objective was to obtain sufficient knowledge about the underlying problems with the current fixture for the part. At this stage of the thesis, a number of essential criteria for fixture design were produced. Information and inspiration were obtained by examining the company?s currently developed fixtures.After gathering the necessary information the process of developing three different fixture concepts started.

Operational Business Intelligence (OpBI) är en typ av Business Intelligence som används i det operativa arbetet och det röner mer och mer intresse. I samarbete med ett företag har en fallstudie genomförts med syftet att etablera och kontextualisera riktlinjer för att kunna införa en ökad automatiseringsgrad i en OpBI-lösning som används för kreditbedömning av fakturor.Studien har fokuserat på att undersöka vilka faktorer som påverkar finansieringsbolag vid val av automatiseringsgrad, val av parametrar att använda vid kreditbedömning samt val av antalet regler som styr automatiseringen. Inom ramen för fallstudien har en analys av det utvalda systemet utförts och intervjuer gjorts med kreditupplysnings­bolagen som är leverantörer av de externa para­metrarna samt intervjuer med sju finansieringsbolag som använder det utvalda systemet.Fall­studien har resulterat i 19 riktlinjer. Resultatet visar att ju högre volym som hanteras, ju högre tidspress det finns i pro­cessen och ju större tillit som finns för en automatisering, desto högre auto­matiseringsgrad väljs..

Utifrån Canvas analysmodell, hur ser Fantastic Franks E-business ut? Hur är synen på E-business hos en liten nischad fastighetsbyrå?Syftet med denna studie är att analysera Fantastic Franks E-business genom Canvas analysmodell och analysera hur differentiering genom E-business påverkar företagets framgång.Genom intervju med ledningsgruppsrepresentant från Fantastic Frank samt med fastighetsmäklare på Fantastic Frank applicerades företagets affärsmodell på modellen Källor till värdeskapande i E-business företag. Denna metod användes för att undersökningens syfte att se hur Fantastic Frank differentierar sig genom E-business skulle kunna undersökas.Nyckelresurser, nyckelpartnerskap och nyckelaktiviteter är de viktigaste blocken inom Canvas analysmodell för Fantastic Frank, för att de ska kunna erbjuda en värdeproposition och differentiera sig. Andra fastighetsbyråer börjar erbjuda liknande tjänster med bostadsstyling och Fantastic Frank bör vidareutveckla sin tjänst. För att skapa värde bör Fantastic Frank utveckla relationer med kunder som köpt eller sålt bostad genom gemensamma intressen inom inredning/design.

AbstractMaster thesis of one year in Business Administration, Swedish Business School at Örebro university,Marketing, HT 2011.Authors: Grunér, Linus and Malm, Ludwig Tutor:Pia Lindell Title:Brand building and creating relationships ? A study of a small business in the B2B market Keywords:Brand building, business relationships, SME, B2B. Problem:How does a small business in the B2B market work with brand building and creating relationships? What critical factors can be identified regarding the process of relationship-building and brand building within the context of a small business in the B2B market? Research objective:The purpose of this study is to use existing research to create understanding for how a company in the B2B market is working with relationship-building and brand building. The study also aims to identify any critical factors concerning the process of relationship-building and brand building.

Apple has since their launch of the Iphone series created a billion dollar business with the market place Appstore. Third-party apps have disrupted the mobile industry, attracted a high number of developers and set the standard for the industry. Despite success, this market has yet not been the topic of any academic study, a fact that makes this thesis important. Under the assumption that apps can be regarded as a service, traditional service marketing theories have been applied with the research goal to map existing business models, evaluate revenue potential and understand best practices of marketing techniques. A series of qualitative interviews with representatives from the difference business models, backed by secondary data describing the domain shows how the Appstore has evolved over time and which marketing practices that appear successful.

Business incubation is an important force of economic development but relatively unheard of in organization theory. This is partly due to the fact that in organization theory, meta-organization or the organization of organizations has been neglected or left lagging as much theorization has been focused on organizing individuals. With the growing number of business incubators, and meta-organizations in general, the need for understanding a relatively new type of organization is prevalent.This case study of the business incubator Global Business Labs Botswana (GBL) aims to clarify the organizational differences among meta-organizations and traditional organizations on a case level, as well as explain the underlying factors for these dissimilarities. With respect to the nature of this case study no general conclusions are drawn from the results. The inference, however, is that the organization of GBL and its incubated companies differs from the traditional organization in five elementary aspects: the weak hierarchical structure, the operational autonomy of its members, the strong focus on recruitment processes, the member identity and the lack of formal sanctions.

AbstractTo benefit the economic growth of a country, it is important for the inhabitants to make the decision to become business owners. Sweden today, apart from the rest of Europe, is facing a growing problem. The numbers of companies are growing, but the numbers of company owners are not. As a result of this, the employment is not able to develop under the same conditions, when the opportunities of employment decrease. Research shows, that the interest for owning a company among the Swedish youth has increased.

Problem: On the basis of the franchisees role and how he look up on his role in his business, should one like the Swedish Law applies characterize the franchisees role as the role of a contractor?Purpose: The purpose with this research is too survey the franchisee in his business and how he looks upon his role as a franchisee and see if this like the Swedish Law states be characterized as the role of a contractor.Methodology: By doing a proportional stratified selection within the the Swedish Franchising community, nine semi structured interviews has been made. The empirical foundation of these interviews has been concentrated and analysed with the support of the chosen theories. The result of the analysis has created the conclusion.Theoretical perspectives: The research is built up of three angels of approach; the role, the business and the economy within the franchisee and the contractor. The three approaches aim too illustrate the role of the franchisee, the franchisees role in the business and the economical effects in franchising.