Executive SummaryThis final thesis has examined the effects of an increased centralization and better coord­in­ation of the distribution logistics at ABB in Västerås. The company is today strongly decent­ralized and there is a minimum of collaboration between the 20 business units. This is why the questions were raised; how could the business units coordinate outbound logistic activities and what effects would that provide. The obj­ect­ive of this final thesis is to provide basic data for a future decision-making which desc­r­ibe these effects.The report has mapped out the factors that are important to ABB in an evaluation of their logistic activities and how the outbound logistics work today. The four factors are cost efficiency, delivery service, environmental impact and logistics capability.

The cost of forwarding corresponds to about one tenth of the forestry industries raw material cost. This gives a motive to do good follow-ups to get a good overview of the forwarding distance and, thus, enable improvements. Follow-ups are also justified by the possibility to make more accurate calculations of the harvesting costs, if better estimations of forwarding distance are achieved. Today (2009) Stora Enso has GPS and vehicle-computers in most of their forwarders. These are used mainly for the forwarder to follow the tracks of the harvester and for the planning leader to see how the forwarder has been driving within the stand.

This report will show the energy usage of Hotel Princess in Sandviken, Sweden. When the hotel changed owner an examination of the hotels heating, ventilation and sanitary systems were done. The report showed flaws in the ventilation system, and is why the new owner wanted a closer look at the energy use of the hotel. The original building was built in the 1930s and two major extensions have been built, one in the 1950s and the most recent in the 1980s. An assumption made is that the building parts were built to the restrictions during the time. Activities on the hotel include sleep over, conference, night club, massage and swimming in the hotels pool section.

The objective of this thesis was to develop a method for the planning of road upgrading at Holmen Skog, a Swedish forest company. A critical issue for creating such plans is to identify roads that are suitable to upgrade to a standard that can handle heavy traffic during spring thaw, since spring thaw is a bottle neck for transporting timber. The method was tested in a case study at a district. The work consisted of two parts. The first was to retrieve and prepare geographical data for the roads.

The purpose with this project is to compare different fuels when investing in a central combustion station at a case study farm. I have chosen to write about biofuel from an economical perspective. This because the heating costs are steadily increasing. Also because the farm in this case study has several different heating systems, which are neither profitable nor easy to work with. I have made calculations regarding usage of splinter, wood and grain for the heating system.

Swedish agriculture stands in front of big changes the whole time. As a milking producer you have to adapt and develop the company to these changes and find the best solution. This potential is easy to find if you compare your company with other similar companies. Labour cost is the biggest cost in milking production after the cost for food. Today it is rather easy to measure how many hours per cow different system of cow houses needs, but we do not know so much about how many hours it takes to breed a calf. To learn more about the labour time with the calves during the first time after the calf was born, I made time studies on five different farms with calf hutches, automatic milk system, large calf boxes, and smaller calf boxes with teat buckets.

The purpose of this master thesis is to map and analyze the appropriate valuation approaches used for Intellectual Property rights and develope a model for valuing patents. This project has been executed on behalf of Electrolux?s Group Intellectual Property and is intended to be used for managerial purposes.Project limitations include patents that doesent concern technology oriented products and services, real option methods, financial forecasts, decisions concerning patents taken by the R&D division, patent applications in general and taking into account unexpected future management decisions regarding patents.Electrolux?s Intellextual Property team applies, manages and protects the groups Intellectual Property rights including patents, designs and trademarks. With an increased globalization and the rise of emerging markets, incentives have increased further to protect and safeguard the group?s innovations.Mainly there are three different valuations approaches for valuing intellectual property rights, these include the income based approach, cost base approach and market based approach.

This thesis is a product development project that was performed at Alfa Laval Tumba AB. In the past Alfa Laval have manufactured gas separators for engines where gas flows were cleaned from oil. A new business area for this kind of technology has shown to be the manufacturing industry where oil mist has to be separated from the vented air. Therefore a new and bigger design is needed to be able to handle the greater gas flows. A product like that would be a strong competitor on the market when the maintenance would be low in comparison to today?s equipment.During the project several concept suggestions were developed using customer interviews and research as input.

This essay focus on three companies within the MSAB group. All companies have shown an incredible share price development since MSAB´s initial investment and ownership. The companies has been examined from the CEO´s perspective to map out similar factors of success. The aim of the study was to compare and see if the companies operate in line with Jim Collins (2001) study of how Great companies operate. The analysis show that, despite the young age of MSAB, ASSA ABLOY and AAK, they all fulfill Collins hard criterias for Great companies..

The door and its surrounding, is an important part of all buildings. It often amount to a significant part of buildings total costs. The more demands of functions the largerdoes the costs grow.The purpose of this report is to analyze those demands and how to fulfill them.Another purpose is to examine of which reasons the cost grow and how to avoid it inthe best possible way. The study will be performed in collaboration with Bjerking AB. To define the demands a literature study will also be performed.

Bakgrund: Fetma är ett folkhälsoproblem som har ökat dramatiskt de senaste två decennierna. För att behandla extrem fetma har magsäcksoperationer blivit en allt mer vanlig metod. De hälsoekonomiska aspekterna av operation har ännu inte studerats i Sverige. Syfte: Studiens syfte var att belysa hälsoekonomiska aspekter av magsäcksoperationer som intervention mot fetma. Metod: Metoden var en litteraturstudie.

Purpose: We will understand and explain Dell?s value gap through an extended intellectual capital theory. This will be done by deriving the value to the different parts of the intellectual capital value scheme. We will also use value scheme to describe the ongoing strategy shift. Methodology: The qualitative method and an abductive reasoning have been employed during the progress.

This study presents a survey of the capital budgeting methods used in investment decisions by selected Swedish firms. The study has a qualitative approach where the main goal is to increase the understanding of why firms use ?incorrect? capital budgeting methods like the payback method despite the well known fact that it is one of the most faulty methods, according to literature in business finance (Brealey. Myers). The study has specially researched the impact of company?s size, investments size, ownership structure, branch traditions and political risks influence on firms capital budgeting..

During recent years the use of TMR (total mixed rations) has increased in Swedish lamb production. For many years TMR has been used for cattle and hence the information and knowledge is vast, while the knowledge concerning sheep and TMR is more limited. The aim of this thesis is to present an overview of the scientific knowledge on the subject, and also to compile practical experience from sheep farmers using TMR. The thesis begins with a literature review where different aspects relevant to the usage of TMR are dealt with. It is concluded that there are differences between sheep and cattle that must be taken into account.

The economic prerequisite to many farmers in Sweden after the EU membership and the new agriculture policy has generated large demands on the farm management. Until year 2004 you got a grant based on what you had produced and not on consumer demand. In 2005 a new economic aid (Mid Term Revue) was introduced and the conditions has changed again. Due to this I have chosen to do a cost-benefit analysis on a case, to investigate if the present production is sustainable in the future. My conclusion is that the profitability is acceptable even if the farm has a high debt. But to make the production more profitable the products produced should be refined as much as possible at the farm, to get maximum economic return.