Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to give a contribution to the studies of what strategies those are of importance for challengers in consumer technological markets aiming for the market leader position. To be able to investigate this phenomenon we have chosen to study Microsoft?s second position in the video game console industry. In addition, we want to illuminate Microsoft?s competitive advantages, how Microsoft can take advantage from Sony?s setbacks and what strategies those are of importance for Microsoft in the battle of becoming the market leader.

This study examines how management consulting firms work with business- and functional strategy and how these strategies are interrelated. More specifically we focus on business strategy (business unit level) and knowledge strategy (functional level) and whether these are aligned or not, i.e. whether strategic congruence exists.A number of recent studies have examined the importance of business strategy and knowledge strategy in management consulting firms separately, but few have pointed out the importance of the alignment between them. With this study we contribute to the strategic field of research with a model that describes how management consulting firms should work with their knowledge strategy given their business strategy. The model is developed through a synthesis between theories in the field of strategic congruence, business- and functional strategies and thereafter tested by an empirical case study of six management consulting firms.

The Main problem: How small-sized manufacturing companies can create and sustain a stable position in the industry, which leads to profitability.Purpose: The purpose with this essay is to compare two small-sized manufacturing companies, Datek Industrielektronik AB and AB Micatrone to study which strategical resources each company possesses. At the same time analyse if the strategical resources are to be consider as sustainable competitive advantage.Method: A case study has been implemented in two small-sized manufacturing companies. The collected primary data derives from semi-structured interviews.Theoretical framework: The theoretical framework is based on The Resource-based view where the independent variables are the VRIO-model, resource tree and external resources. The dependable variable is sustainable competitive advantage.Empirical foundation: The empirical foundation is based on the compilation of the few conducted interviews with Datek and Micatrone.Results & Conclusion: Datek and Micatrone show both similarities and differences in what creates their sustainable competitive advantage. The management of both companies creates according to the VRIO-model sustainable competitive advantage.

Aim: The aim of this essay is to study the communication strategy that the company SATS developed before taking over the company e2. The following questions are to be answered: - what was the planned communication strategy before taking over the company e2? - did SATS follow their original plan when implementing this strategy? ? Which strengths and weaknesses of the communication strategy can be identified based on opinions of the employees?Material/Method: Together with literature and document studies, a qualitative method has been used and seven personal interviews have been conducted. One informant was selected due to professional position; the other six respondents were former employees of the affected company e2.Main results: The main results from the study show that the company SATS did in fact follow their plan very accurately with only some minor changes such as an earlier started education program and exclusion of an initially planned evaluation activity. Communication about the takeover of e2 to employees was quick and clear.

In today?s fast changing environment it is important for knowledge intense companies that want to stay competitive to actively work with their knowledge, knowledge sharing and Knowledge Management (KM). Barriers decrease the efficiency of how knowledge is created, stored and shared, and they are therefore important to reduce or preferably remove making the KM activities result in as much value for the organisation as possible. To achieve this, it is important that the KM activities become a natural part of the employees? daily work.

This thesis examines a possible control strategy to minimize flow fluctuations in Uppsala?s district heating system. High variations in flow rate may lead to complications caused by hydraulic constraints in the district heating system. These complications, such as inadequate pressure and temperature levels, increase the risk of heat delivery failures. It is therefore important to avoid such situations both for the producer and for the customers.Typically, the forward temperature is controlled by using a rough correlation with respect to the outdoor temperature.

Social media, such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, have become popular platforms for social communication, and, increasingly, also important channels for business marketing. For a business intending to use social media for marketing, however, developing a strategy and building a trademark can be a challenge. This report describes how a small, newly established business enterprise can develop a digital strategy with clear goals and practical guidelines. The report describes a digital strategy for Gelato Scarfó and shows how this strategy is made concrete through a set of guidelines. The guidelines develop a trademark for identification and loyalty, and give advice on how new materials can be made consistent with the trademark..

Background: Mass customization has been identified as a competitive business strategy by both companies and academics because of its ability to incorporate the voice of the customer into companies? products and services. Although mass customization may sound appealing, the strategic concept is still developing and firms adopting this business strategy face several challenges. Production concerns are of high relevance since mass customization implies a high level of customer involvement in the product design. Since the areas are closely linked it is reasonable to ask how a mass customization strategy affects production concerns.

Background: As Porter?s diamond (1990) suggested, the business environment highly influences firms? strategies. Today, most of the companies have to decide their strategy depending from a worldwide business environment. Yet, strategy researches and the growing importance of marketing for business success also show that customer dimension must be taken into consideration. On some markets and in certain industries, the offer is much higher than the demand and then, companies need to attract customers.

Background: Many authors consider knowledge to be a significant source for competitive advantage. Replicating companies found their competitiveness on an ability to leverage its knowledge base by replicating its business model in new contexts, a process often referred to as the McDonalds approach. Several authors emphasize that an efficient method for knowledge transfer may increase the risk for imitation. Purpose: The purpose of this study is to examine in an explorative manner how strategies for replicating complex knowledge systems are employed and developed. Furthermore, our ambition is to explore the notion of replication strategy.

The hotel industry in Stockholm is characterized by intense competition, and within the next couple of years the construction of a number new hotels is planed. As the number of hotels in Stockholm increase, the competition will increase and the importance of having well functioning strategies will become vital. The purpose of this essay is to examine how two hotels within the hotel industry in Stockholm experience and handle the competition. The two hotels that are included in the study are Clarion Hotel Stockholm and Scandic Continental. The essay derives from models and theories that are related to marketing and competition.

The focus in this study is on the situation of Roma in Sweden. The purpose is to see the integration strategies that are reflected in Swedish politics, considering the inclusion of Roma. Idea analysis has been used as method, and I have analysed the text to find expressions of four different ideal types that represent four different types of integrations processes. The material consists of the government?s strategy plan for the Roma?s inclusion in Sweden between 2012-2032.

The climate at the labour-market in Sweden today means that students who have recently passed their examinations find it quite difficult to find work. The competetiveness calls for a strategy to find advantages in the employment process. The strategy explored in this thesis is called personal branding. We believe that by building a strong personal brand you can increase the possibilities to influence the decisions of those responsible for recruitments in our society. The question we ask ourselves in this essay is how to build a personal brand with the power to give students a competetive advantage in the employment process.

Companies will increasingly begin to link their applications, and the technology that makesthis possible is called integration. The more applications that are connected, the more of the company's data flows through these integrations. It is also clear that data analyses to create business value and to get competitive advantages against its competitors are important. In this paper, we examine how companies create business value and competitive advantages throughthe integration platforms and metadata from the integrations. We have interviewedpeople from three companies in the industrial sector, each with an integration platform.We have also interviewed Enfo Zystems, a company that provides development andmanagement of integration platforms to these customers.

A quantitative study was conducted with the aim to investigate whether individuals use a specific conflict strategy when they are in a task conflict or a relationship conflict in their workplace. The study also examined whether individuals experience positive or negative effects of a task conflict or a relationship conflict when a specific conflict strategy have been used. Previous research explains the effects of task conflicts and relationship conflicts at the workplace (De Dreu, 2008) Likewise lifts the effects of the conflict strategies interaction, avoidance, and power and coercion (Hoerr, 2005; Meyer, 2004; Trudel & Reio Jr., 2011). However it does not tie together what the conflicts and conflict strategies have for effects together. This also means that it is impossible to discern if there is a strategy that is frequently used in a specific conflict type.