AbstractC-level essay in political science, by Frida Orlinder, spring semester 2008Supervisor: Susan Marton?Good contracting? ? A study of contracting in public procurement regarding the transportation of school children?Over the last decades models influenced by the market have been gaining influence in public administration all over the world. New Public Management has been presented as a theoretical ?shopping basket? from which concepts can be applied to the administration of municipal services. The purpose of this essay is to investigate in an explorative way how New Public Management (NPM) views contracting and the role of the internal customer in contracting.

An increasingly globalized market is leading to hard competition among manufacturing companies, which means that they are forced to become more customer focused to survive in the market. A Customer Relationship Management system is a system that will be of assistance to help companies succeed in building long term relationships with their customers. Best of Breed and ERP-based are two types of CRM systems. The study has focused on analyzing and examine the need for CRM systems at manufacturing companies. Our question formulation has been:? What need do businesses want to satisfy with a Best of Breed-based and ERP-based CRM system?? Are there any differences in the use of Best of Breed-based and ERP-based CRM system?In this study, we have chosen to carry out interviews and quantitative surveys with manufacturing companies to get their view of CRM-systems.

Groupon is a popular group-buying website where they act as an intermediary between buyers and sellers. The company has grown rapidly and was established in Sweden in the year of 2010. The aim of this study is to investigate if businesses that have been marketed in Stockholm and that have been co-operating with Groupon have been affected in terms of customer loyalty and profitability. Furthermore the study also examines consumer?s opinions, purchase behavior and loyalty against Groupons business partners.

Syfte: Att identifiera de problem och/eller svårigheter som uppstått efter införandet av IAS 39 och dess krav på att finansiella instrument ska värderas till verkligt värde. Metod: Uppsatsen har genomförts med hjälpa av en induktiv metod. Primärdata har samlats in genom kvalitativa intervjuer. Sekundärdata består av facklitteratur och vetenskapliga artiklar. Teoretiska perspektiv: Teorin om det institutionella tänkandet har använts samt Streek & Schmitters modell.

Bakgrund: Private Equity bolag är kända för sin förvaltande och finansiellt inriktade syn på förvärv av företag. Ofta hålls ett kortsiktigt förvaltningsperspektiv av PE investerare då dessa avser att avyttra målbolaget inom ett par år för att erhålla en god vinst. Det är av intresse att utföra en statistisk analys om vad som ligger som grund för när ett PE bolag väljer att genomföra ett uppköp och om man kan förutse när ett bolag är attraktivt för investering. Tidigare undersökningar har gjorts inom ämnet på den amerikanska tillverkningsindustrin, samt på enskilda länder i Europa men inga studier har utförts på den europeiska tillverkningsmarknaden i sin helhet.Syfte: Studien har avsett att undersöka huruvida det med hjälp av en modell byggd på finansiella nyckeltal går att förutsäga om ett europeiskt noterat tillverkningsbolag är attraktivt för uppköp av Private Equity investerare.Metod: Utredningen omfattar ett begränsat urval av 138 tillverkningsföretag, noterade på börser inom Europeiska Unionen, som genom en logistisk regressionsmodell byggd på finansiella nyckeltal förutser uppköp under perioden 2000-01-01 till 2010-11-15.Resultat: Attraktiva uppköpsbolag inom den europeiska tillverkningsindustrin visade sig ha ett lågt marknadsvärde över bokfört värde samt starka fria kassaflöden. Målbolagets storlek samt tillgångstyper hade marginellt inflytande på PE investerare.

Society has seen a tremendous increase in threats, violence and especially unprovoked violence perpetrated by youths. Violence and more seriously unprovoked violence has become a major problem for many service corporations as it gives them bad image and reputation. Corporate Social Responsibility CSR encourages many companies to engage in social activities as they realize that the company is part of the society and the environment. What affects society may sooner or later affect the corporate. For any business to prosper and create a long-term relationship with its customers, it needs a safe environment both for the customers and staff.Feedback from customers and staff is survival and these two (customer and staff) are the most vital assets any firm could have.

The use of group contribution between consolidated firms is a common phenomenon in Sweden where taxation is not based on the return on the consolidated level but on the return on the individual firms. However, the process of handling the group contribution does not work without problems. This thesis analyzes three main issues where group contributions oppose the Swedish Companies Act. ? The Swedish Companies Act enacts the decision regarding group contributions to be made at a shareholder?s meeting.

Vobbla Racing is a racing team who has an online sales department that is in need of an upgrade to be more efficient and easier to use. Before this study their present homepage was anything but structured. The products were sorted in an illogical order which made it difficult for the customer to find a wanted product. The customer had to summarize the products, transport sums and other costs. The order had to be e-mailed or phoned in to Vobbla Racing Produkter.

Since the year 2005 listed companies are supposed to use international accounting standards when they set up their group accountancy. One thing that has changed with the new standards is the accounting of goodwill and long-lived intangible assets. Earlier companies were supposed to write of their goodwill during the years they had expected the extra profit to arise. According to the new regulation, an impairment test shall be done annually, as well as when there is an indication of decreased value. According to IAS 36 point 134, the company shall provide information in their accountancy about the impairment test.The aim of this study is to find out if some companies may be willing to reveal less information in their accountancy, and if there are any factors that affect this.

Title:Pecking-order i små tillverkande företag Level of thesis:Master´s dissertation in banking and auditing Authors:Mathias Klasén and Maria Waderoth Advisor:Joakim Winborg Background:The area of business financing has been well studied during the 1900´s. Many studies and theories are made with big corporations in mind, and the importance of small businesses wasn?t enlightened until the end of the 1900´s. Business financing has created a number of theories, among them Myers pecking-order theory. This theory implies that business managers prefer internal equity in front of debt and external equity.

Background to problem: Pensions play a big role in people's lives when life expectancy continues to increase. Companies can choose different ways of reporting their pension plans, and within the defined benefit pension plan poses the actuarial gains and losses that can be reported based on three different methods. Only one method will exist from 2013, how will the companies that use the other two handle the new situation?Purpose: Investigate why different companies have chosen to report its actuarial gains and losses along the corridor approach, directly against income or directly in equity. How will the companies that use the corridor method manage the situation when it will only be allowed to report in other comprehensive income as of 2013 and how will this affect them.Methodology: Data was collected through qualitative questionnaires sent to companies listed on Nasdaq OMX Nordic Stockholm, Large Cap and Mid Cap, and a qualitative interview.

In recent time, agile methods have been devoted much attention, and the concept is widely used in the IT industry in particular. An increasing number of companies are interested in this way of working. The following report is the result of a study on the ability to create value for customers in business development through the use of agile methods. We ask what the advantages and limitations of agile methods are in the creation of customer value. Grounded Theory and an initial literature review was used to answer this question.

AbstractThe customer demand for ecological products has increased in recent years, within the garden industry this mainly concerns herbs and other edible plants. The organic trend is increasing and more people are aware of the environment and want to take responsibility for it through their purchases for their garden as well.In this essay the aim is to investigate customer demand and the possibility of selling organicperennial plants in eight garden centres on the Åland islands and in Gävle/Sandviken. I include two garden centres with an organic profile to get a wider point of view. I investigate the global market for organic perennials and look further into existing certification standards on the Swedish market today.The methods I have been using are interviews and a literature study.The study shows that the experienced demand for organic perennials is small in both of myinvestigated groups. The biggest motivation for starting to sell organic perennials would be to find a supplier of these plants and that more customer would ask for them.

Aim: The aim of this study is to do a comparative study between Swedish Ethical equity Funds with Swedish traditional equity funds in terms of return, risk and risk-adjusted return.Theory: Sharpe ratio and Modigliani-Modigliani.Method: The essay will be based on a quantitative research method in which secondary data is the basis for the calculations. A statistical analysis was applied.Conclusion: The study concludes that there is no significant difference between the ethical fund group and the traditional fund group in terms of return, risk and risk-adjusted returns. The traditional fund group was those who had the best returns but only by small margins..

Background: The use of digital marketing channels during the last years has increased significantly, especially the use of marketing on the Internet. Hence the communication chart of marketing has been redrawn. The technological development has had a major impact on the marketing discipline. The integration of information technology and marketing has resulted in the emergence of a new field, namely e-marketing. Hence the need for further research is desirable.Purpose: The purpose of this study is to examine alternative marketing procedures that a company can apply to increase the digital awareness and manage their customer relationships.Theoretical framework: Theories regarding digital marketing cycle, SEO and customer relationship.Method: This research is based on data collected through a primary semi-structured interview with a company active in the corporate information industry which also provides a RFQ service.