Today, branding is not a phenomenon but rather a prerequisite for a brand to be able to both survive and grow stronger. During the last couple of years, personal branding has come to be an established term, just like corporate branding. With the growth of the social media and the thousands of ways to interact with each other personal brands face great competition. It is more difficult than ever to maintain a strong brand, partly because of this. There are several growth options for brands.

Mezzanine is a collective term for hybrid instruments on the leverage finance market, offered as an alternative to traditional debt. As a hybrid, mezzanine combines elements of debt and equity financing. Mezzanine appears, in its most common shape, as subordinated to the senior debt, but ranks higher than pure equity. Reminiscent of security interests, the main importance of subordination is upon the default of the borrower. Therefore, the aim of the thesis is partly to investigate the legal prerequisites for a solid subordination of mezzanine financing, and partly to explain the consequences of subordination in a default.

The main purpose is to illuminate how a company links certain values to its brand in an effort to achieve a competitive position. We have done this by studying the government owned company Svenska Spel and its entrance on the netpokermarket. With Corporate Social Responsibility as a guidance for the company they wanted to offer Swedish gamblers an alternative to the, often morally dubious, international actors. Our thesis has taken an internal (corporate) as well as an external (consumer) perspective on the result of this strive. Our conclusions are that although Svenska Spel is successfully integrating social responsibility into their netpokerbusiness, they are facing a difficulty in making the consumer fully appreciate it.

Stratego is a boardgame not very different from chess, that contains hidden information. Because of this, existing programs play at beginner level. The purpose of this thesis is to adjust a minimax algorithm so that it passes the demands of Stratego, and then build a Stratego agent around it. Tests with existing minimax algorithms leads to the development p-e-minimax. This algorithm uses two different values in its nodes to simulate the different information available to the agent and its opponent.

Background: Corporate Responsibility is not a new concept however in recent times more companies are starting to use different kinds of responsibility disclosures. These disclosures are voluntary and corporations may use them in the way they find suits them best. There is a lot of research in this field and there is no single explanation for what Corporate Responsibility is and how corporations should relate to it.Purpose: The purpose of the study is to examine the relationship between the controlling owners of corporations and CSR disclosure.Method: We use a content analysis and a survey study to examine the relationship between corporate controlling owners and the CSR disclosure.Conclusions: Our results show that controlling owners have little effect on the different dimensions of CSR disclosure. We have however found some differences between the different owner categories where some categories are found to use CSR disclosure to a greater extent..

Purpose: To examine the governance mechanisms and the competence PE-firms adds to theirholding companies through an active ownership in order to create growth.Methodology: A qualitative study with interviews as its main source of data.Theoretical perspectives: Corporate governance and relevant theories within that subjectsuch as agent theory, board of directors and management. Previous research within the subjectwill also be presented.Empirical foundation: The empirical foundation consists of three conducted interviews anddata collected from the chosen PE-firms as well as six different holding companies.Conclusions: The governance mechanisms used in the PE-firms we have chosen are stronglyrelated to both theories within corporate governance as well as previous research on thesubject. The governance mechanisms being used are an explicit owners agenda and strategy, athorough acquisition process, usage of external competence, active ownership through theboard of directors and the insertion of incentive systems..

The purpose of this thesis is to examine how social procurement can be a further development of public-private partnership. This is done with interviews and a case study of the social procurement Mitt Gröna Kvarter and its labor effort Boendebyggarna. The theoretical framework used in the thesis consists of public-private partnership and corporate social responsibility. It tries to answer the following questions:What does this social procurement mean by the concept of public-private partnership?What does this social procurement mean for the participants involved?How can social procurement be seen as a further development of public-private partnership?The thesis uses the theory development around the concepts of public-private partnership and corporate social responsibility and shows that social procurement does indeed have similarities to public-private partnership and could very well be a further development of it..

Corporate Social ResponsibilityThis thesis intends to exam the strategic use of Corporate Social Responsibility within fifthteen different companies, classified/divided into three various industries. The aim is to compare the three different industries, to look for disparities and similarities in their use of CSR. The disseration looks into both variance and resemblance in the use of Corporate Social Responsibility between the companies within the same branch of trade and between the industries.The industries of intrestThe three industries that the study has focus on is consumer, manufacturing and service related industries. Where the consumer industry is classified as companies with direct sales towards private consumers, the physical citizen. The manufacturing industry is classified as companies that manufacture products but that does´nt sell their products directly to the regular consumer.

Background: Corporate Responsibility is not a new concept however in recent times more companies are starting to use different kinds of responsibility disclosures. These disclosures are voluntary and corporations may use them in the way they find suits them best. There is a lot of research in this field and there is no single explanation for what Corporate Responsibility is and how corporations should relate to it.Purpose: The purpose of the study is to examine the relationship between the controlling owners of corporations and CSR disclosure.Method: We use a content analysis and a survey study to examine the relationship between corporate controlling owners and the CSR disclosure.Conclusions: Our results show that controlling owners have little effect on the different dimensions of CSR disclosure. We have however found some differences between the different owner categories where some categories are found to use CSR disclosure to a greater extent..

As of 1 July 2008 the revised Swedish Code of Corporate Governance applies to all Swedish companies whose shares are traded on a regulated market in Sweden. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate whether the introduction of the revised Code has affected the disclosure practice among Swedish companies. We investigate a sample of 43 small and mid cap companies listed on the OMXS Exchange that has previously not been covered by the regulation. We develop a disclosure index, measuring the disclosure level in annual reports before and after the introduction of the Code. The results from the study show that disclosure level has not increased after the introduction of the Code.

Aim: The aim of this essay is to study the work of an alcohol company?s (Pernod Ricard) corporate social responsibility and how this work is being communicated to the company?s stakeholders. Furthermore I aim to describe the profile of the specific company, in other words how they wish their stakeholders to experience the company. I will then compare this profile with the image of how the interviewed stakeholders actually perceive the corporate social responsibility activities. Are there any differences?Material/Method: Together with literature and document studies, a qualitative method has been used and four focus group interviews with a total of 16 stakeholders have been conducted.Main results: The main results from the focus group interviews showed that the stakeholders appreciated corporate social responsibility work that focuses on the protection of young people.

Corporate Storytelling är ett relativt nytt begrepp inom marknadsföringsområdet. Mycket kortfattat kan det förklaras som en teknik där företag använder sig av berättelser för att förpacka varumärkets värderingar på ett fängslande sätt. På så sätt hoppas företaget väcka engagemang och intresse hos konsumenten samt få åhöraren att föra budskapet vidare. Corporate Storytelling är svårt att kvantifiera, då alla företag och deras berättelser är unika. Därför har vi valt att selektera en specifik grupp företag ? Sveriges kungliga hovleverantörer.

Detta arbete handlar om hur teorier om offentlig gestaltning av bostadsgårdar, miljöpsykologi och corporate garden kan hjälpa till med verktyg för gestaltningen av en trädgård med flera funktioner; näringsverksamhet i form av Hotell- och Restaurangrörelse samt privat boende.Litteraturstudier genomfördes i ovan nämnda områden och ägarnas önskemål samlades in via enkät, mail korrespondens och samtal vid besök på platsen. Då noterades även platsens förutsättningar och de delar av tomten som skulle gestaltas mättes upp.Den samlade informationen har sedan resulterat i ett designförslag som omfattar fem platser i trädgården. Dessa platser representerar områden som betecknas som privata, halvprivata, halvoffentliga samt en del som representerar en corporate garden..

Brands are the instruments corporates use to create and communicate brands reputation. Within the different industries for consumer products intangible assets such as brands are known to have great importance for corporate prosperities. When consumers experiences a specific brand symbolizes best possible value for money, the corporate behind it has managed to create a unique competitive advantage that should be to its full potential. Strong brands can pose the difference between winning or loosing on the market. Due to this brands should be considered as cost-effective instruments since they help create financial advantages such as consumer loyalty.

Bakgrund: Corporate rebranding är ett relativt nytt fenomen som innebär att ett företag väljer att omdefiniera sitt varumärke på grund av förändringar inom företaget eller omgivningen. Men det är fortfarande relativt ostuderat och ingen studie behandlar den eventuella kopplingen med en dynamisk marknad.Syfte: Syftet med denna studie är att skapa en förståelse för hur fenomenet corporate rebranding fungerar inom en dynamisk marknad, där vi valt att utgå från telekombranschen som exempelmarknad.Metod: Studien har en hermeneutisk ansats med ett deduktivt angreppssätt för kopplingen mellan teori och empiri. Studien har vidare använt sig av en komparativ design med fallstudieinslag utifrån en kvalitativ strategi.Referensram: Referensramen består av teorier om dynamiska marknader som leder in till globalisering, lokalisering samt glokalisering. Därefter definieras varumärke med respektive underliggande teorier och avslutningsvis corporate rebranding.Slutsats: Den dynamiska marknaden har gett upphov till ett stort antal rebranding-processer inom branschen, där tre strategier för att hantera ett nytt globalt varumärke har identifierats. Slutligen har varumärkets roll inom branschen blivit av en mer dynamisk karaktär där syftet är att ha ett varumärke som är mest lämpat för de förändringar som skett inom såväl den interna som externa miljön..