One of the most distinguishing features of contemporary globalisation is production fragmentation, a splitting up of the manufacturing of a good into several different stages. Production fragmentation creates new opportunities through vertical specialization; a country incapable of mastering the entire production process may specialize in the manufacturing of one separate part. The aim of this thesis is to examine to what extent international integration affects a country?s ability to engage in vertical specialization in an industry characterized by production fragmentation. The analysis focuses on the european integration process over the last decade, where countries in eastern Europe with relatively low labour costs have been integrated with more capital abundant western economies.

The different material layers as part of a road construction fill all a function so theroad becomes durable, safe, comfortable and aesthetically pleasing. Recently, anew group of construction materials started to play an important role in roadconstruction ? geosynthetics.This thesis addresses the two most common types ofgeosynthetics used in modern road construction, namely geogrids and geotextiles.The most common use of geogrids is reinforcement of poor subgrade by usinggeogrid soil reinforcement, which occurs when road material particles wedge inthe geogrid?s mesh. Geotextiles act partly as a barrier that prevents the finermaterial in the below ground from being mixed with coarser upper material andalso act as a load spreader.Road contractors often face a choice of whether geogrids and/or geotextiles areappropriate in a particular road project and also how much profit the choice mightbring. This phase in the tender calculation process is the intended scope of thisthesis.The thesis deals with both the "hard" cost-function aspects and the "softer" values e.g.

During the last 20 years, the Swedish health care system has faced major changes. One of them is the increasing pressure to generate economic profit due to private businesses entering the market. Health care units are forced to make some structural changes in order to become effective and efficient. As a result merger and acquisitions has become a part of the health care sector, and seems to be an increasing phenomenon. Mergers and acquisitions have mainly been studied in the industry.

When constructing a new house many questions appear, from architecture to decisions regarding installations. Sweden is situated in a cold part of the planet and questions regarding which heating system to install face everyone who decides to build a new house. This thesis describes a construction solution of a villa in Kiruna. The extended essay analyzes which heating system is most suitable for the construction. The options are geothermal, district and pellet heating systems.

AbstractThe banking industry has during later years gone through several technological changes (Svenska Bankföreningen 2014). These big changes have led to several advantages seen both from a customer ? and corporate point of view. Advantages in easier usage, increased availability and more competition have made the banks more cost effective at the same time as the customer is being offered better prices. Even though the advantages seem to weigh over the disadvantages there are still those who thinks that things where ?better in the past?.

This master thesis was done for a company called BRUKS which is active in woodprocessing,bio-energy and bulk material handling industry. The idea for the master thesis wasto develop a new reclaiming method for silos where wood chips are being stored. A mediumsegment of between 1000 ? 5000 m3was defined as the segment with the most sales potential.Two different concepts were produced, one for new constructions and one for rebuildingalready existing silos.In the beginning of the master thesis a lot of time was spent on visiting different BRUKSoffices and customers to get an overview of the industry and the product. This informationwas the basis when the idea generating phase began.

Large volumes of excavated soil and rock are generated in building- and construction projects. These materials need to be transported longer and longer distances due to the densifications of cities. The transportation affects the environment in terms of noise and emissions, but also makes high demands on road infrastructure. To reduce the transport distances an increased responsibility for the excavated rock generated needs to be taken. Responsibility can be increased through an introduction of means of control.

Title: Argument in favour of and against private health care ? A scenario for a future health care with a possibly new Government Authors: Jessica Andersson, Nina Gunnarsson Supervisor: Thomas Danborg Department: School of Management, Blekinge Institute of Technology Course: Bachelor?s thesis in Business Administration, 10 credits Purpose: To describe the problem with privatizing of the health care by analyse the arguments in favour of and against private health care and describe a scenario about a future health care with a possibly new Government. Method: Qualitative Grounded theory method, categorizing secondary facts in order to get the complete picture. Results: The market for private health care will increase by a possibly new Government.

Abstract Title: A conjoint analysis of packaging attributes. How can the attributes of a product?s packaging best look like to attract the consumer? Authors: Linda Granberg & Helena Niklasson Supervisor: Jan Svanberg Department: School of Management, Blekinge Institute of Technology Course: Bachelor?s thesis in Business Administration, 15 credits Purpose: The purpose is to find out how visual and technical attributes on product packaging affects the consumers tendency to want to buy the product. Method: Conjoint analysis and a quantitative survey. Results: When developing a package for a food product we?ve reached the conclusion that it is most important to have clear product information on it.

In the EU there are EC Directives that Member States of EU should follow. Sweden has undertaken to transpose EC Directives regarding the working environment to Swedish Provisions.  In 4 April 2006, the European Commission had some criticism against the Swedish implementation of the Construction Sites Directive. The Swedish Work Environment Authority has in response to this criticism reworked the Work Environment Act and related provision about building and civil engineering work. The changes came into force 1 January 2009.These changes have resulted in some working methods and even new responsibility subjects must be reviewed. The purpose of this exam project was to investigate if contractors and clients in the construction sector, had have time to update themselves on this front and adapt to these changes.

Companies within the e-commerce industry currently try to overcome the disadvantages of not being able to provide a physical inspection of products, and this is especially an issue for the apparel industry. One way of trying to overcome this issue is by presenting apparel with a short video of a model wearing the garment. The aim in this thesis is to investigate how these video presentations affect consumers' emotions, cognitions and intentions. Since previous studies have found that different shopping scenarios can moderate the effect of stimuli in the atmosphere on the consumers' emotions, we also aim to see if a video presentation, depending on the shopping scenario, could have a negative impact on site visitors. Moreover this thesis investigates the moderating effects of involvement on consumers' cognitions.

The way society categorize different people into groups is problematic in the sense that the categorization can seem stigmatizing and have social consequences for those being categorized. Immigrants are one of those problematic categories.The following essay studies this categorization of ?immigrants? based on a governmental investigation of structural discrimination that took place in 2002-2008. The aim is to study the use of the category ?immigrant? and the consequences that follows such a categorization.

Purpose: Our purpose is to describe and understand how a project-based, knowledge-intensive firm in the high-technology industry creates and transfers knowledge, seen from two perspectives.Methodology: Our qualitative case study has an explorative approach since earlier studies within our positioning are absent, thus we look at KM abductively. To gain more depth to our study, we mirror our findings from our case company with data collected from three additional organisations.Theoretical perspectives: We see a clear distinction between researchers, either seeing knowledge as an object or a process. Thus, we review theories from both sides, either focusing on the creation or transferring of knowledge. In addition, theories on KM in project organisations areaccounted for.Empirical foundation: The study is based on the empirical foundation which consists of the data received through six interviews with employees at our main case company and, additionally, two interviews at each of our three mirrorcompanies.Conclusion: The study found KM being seen from both perspectives in all four firms. Through this, we found implications for how our case company could proceed in the future..

In the last decade, member states of the European Union have adopted a range of measures to decrease the dependency on fossil fuels. This has led to an increased use of biomass in heat and power production. In some countries, the lack of forest resource has led to large scale power producers importing their biomass needs. Due to high energy content and homogeneity, wood pellets have become an internationally traded commodity used for large scale power production. The Baltic States have emerged as one of the largest wood pellet exporting regions in Europe.

Vi, Anna Nilsson och Jeanette Svensson, valde att producera musikvideos under vårat kandidatarbete på Blekinge tekniska högskola. Detta eftersom vi båda har ett stort intresse till musik och rörlig bild. Vi valde att göra två stycken för att lära oss produktionens process grundligt och för att nu kunna jämför de båda och av detta ta lärdom. Den ena musikvideon gjorde vi till en skånsk duett som heter KC och den andra till Advance Patrol. Båda låtarna är inom genren hiphop. Vårt mål med projektet var att skapa två videos som inte följde den generella mallen för hiphop-videos.