This thesis examines the established theories on the phenomena of merger of equals. In contrast to an acquisition, a merger of equals is complex since the very nature of it entails that none of the involved parties are in control. Merger of equals are therefore viewed as one of the most difficult types of partnership and data show that over fourty percent of all mergers fail to achieve their targets. Still, research on the phenomena is limited. The main purpose of this thesis is to analyse the implicit factors to why a merger of equals fail.

Background: Acquisitions are a well-known method for increasing company size and strength on the market. But to reach the targets set, more than just a positive economic calculation is required. An atmosphere that supports the company's integration is needed, for which it is of great importance for management to understand the underlying sets of values that exist in the organisation, and to take into consideration the way they might become an obstacle or a tool for a successful integration. Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to explain and understand how cultural change occurs and how it affects the employee, as a smaller company is bought and integrated into a larger organisation. Procedure: The analysis is based on theories on organisational culture and organisational change.

This paper investigates the compensation for risk in the context of the Swedish stock market with a special focus on downside risk. Using daily market data collected from the A-list of the Stockholm Stock Exchange between the years 1983 and 2005 the purpose is to answer the question whether Swedish investors are compensated for holding stocks with high downside risk, measured as downside beta. Using panel data analysis it is shown, in accordance with most previous evidence in international research, firstly that stocks with high beta values on average experience higher returns than stocks with low beta values, and secondly that stocks with high downside beta values experience higher returns than stocks with high beta values in general. On the other hand, cross-sectional regression methodology using a bivariate regression approach shows that downside beta does not explain excess returns very well. Instead, regression analysis suggest that high upside beta does a much better job in explaining excess return over this time period compared to downside beta.

Uppsalahem AB is a municipally owned real estate concern that owns and administrates housing for nearly 30 000 people. The company puts a lot of effort into reducing the energy use of their housing stock. This project is a master?s thesis in the energy systems programme at Uppsala University, carried out in collaboration with Uppsalahem. The aim of this thesis is to provide energy saving measures for fourteen student housing buildings in Uppsala, Sweden.

???This study has been made with the purpose of gaining an understanding of how a Swedish company may think and act concerning their internal control. An American body, COSO, have for some time published documents containing guidelines for how companies should go about this process, however, when conducting this study we were not aware of the extent to which companies in Europe and mainly Sweden used them. In order to learn about this, and also to gain an understanding of when these guidelines are appropriate, we conducted a case study with a large-sized, multinational Swedish company. We also conducted an interview with an expert in internal control monitoring, Anna-Clara af Ekenstam of Pricewaterhouse Coopers, in order to get the perspective of the evaluators in this process and to gain some insight as to whether our case is typical in Sweden or not. We found that our company disregards certain aspects of internal control condoned by COSO, while performing better on other dimensions.

The world has changed its understanding of environmental issues dramatically and more people are showing awareness of social and environmental problems. Various stakeholders have increasingly begun to show an interest in how companies are taking responsibility for their actions. This has led to an improved activity amongst organizations to make their production consequences positive. They work with Corporate and Social Responsibility (CSR). In order to communicate their responsibilities, many companies work with CSR and ethical guidelines.

The purpose of this master?s thesis is to contribute to the development of business relationships between a supplier and its customers. The research area and research problem was further developed into three research questions. The research questions concerns the following subjects: the substance of business relationships and dimensions within relationships management that can be used in order to contribute to the development of a company?s business relationships.

Construction companies in Sweden have for recent years seen an increase in the numbers ofwarranty complaints associated with the market of resident buildings and the cost for this hasbeen measured to over 1.2 billion SEK per year. Working with poor quality cost as a way ofcreating insight about defects within the company?s processes is a method developed and usedby the manufacturing industry for decades, but have not yet reached the construction industry.This study has been performed in collaboration with a Swedish construction company, wherethe author has been stationed at the aftersales division for residential buildings. Owing tocircumstances, this published report has been made anonymous regarding the company whowill further on be namedthe Company. The Company is aware that warranty claims producegreat costs and has requested a way of putting cost and cause to specific claims in order ofreceiving a more specific cost view and to make the reuse of knowledge more efficient.

The aim with this study is to investigate the market reactions to announcements of special dividends and redemptions in Sweden and thus if these announcements can signal information. This study is an event study, where the event is the day of the announcement of a suggestion regarding issuance of special dividends or redemptions. The abnormal returns were estimated for two samples with the market adjusted returns model, one including special dividend announcing firms and the other redemption announcing firms. The signalling hypothesis and the hypothesis of a tax induced clientele effect are the most important hypotheses for this study. The efficient market hypothesis is another theoretical base that may explain the market reactions to the studied announcements, especially the pre-announcement activities that may occur.

The aim of this report is to increase the knowledge and understanding of the problems within the production at AQ Enclosure systems, and thereby achieve a more stable flow throughout the whole process, a better working environment and better competition advantages. The internal flow along with the external cooperation is very important for the company, because it views flexibility and short leadtime as it is the most important competitive means. The part of AQ production that?s been investigated is the manufacturing of ATM-machines, where the costumer is Banqit. This company is a rater small company with about 4 % of the world market of ATM-machines.In order to achieve the aim of the report extensive interviews have been carried out with employees at AQ.

The purpose of this thesis was to examine why so many CRM-projects didn`t reach the expected goals that companies management envisaged. The purpose was divided into two research questions. ? How should companies? management design the strategic projection of the CRM implementation? ? How will employees? attitude to changes influence the result of the CRM implementation? The case company was a Swedish technical consulting company: interviews were conducted with two represents from two different departments. The findings of the study were that management often strongly believes that software will sort out most of the upcoming problems and forget the factor that education of employees is at least equal important.

Construction companies in Sweden have for recent years seen an increase in the numbers ofwarranty complaints associated with the market of resident buildings and the cost for this hasbeen measured to over 1.2 billion SEK per year. Working with poor quality cost as a way ofcreating insight about defects within the company?s processes is a method developed and usedby the manufacturing industry for decades, but have not yet reached the construction industry.This study has been performed in collaboration with a Swedish construction company, wherethe author has been stationed at the aftersales division for residential buildings. Owing tocircumstances, this published report has been made anonymous regarding the company whowill further on be namedthe Company. The Company is aware that warranty claims producegreat costs and has requested a way of putting cost and cause to specific claims in order ofreceiving a more specific cost view and to make the reuse of knowledge more efficient.

The aim has been to create a new student housing where there should be more togetherness between people who live in the residents. The house will have more common areas for the integration of students for a pleasant stay in Växjö. We have concentrated on finding and solving the interior design of the joint surfaces. The proposal consists of CAD- drawings.The student area is intended to be placed on the Brände udde, which is part of Campusvision 2005..

The purpose of this study is to describe if and how a seasonal based company named SkiStar, learns through the exchange of experience and knowledge. We have analyzed gathered qualitative and empirical data to explore this subject. We conducted three semi-structured group interviews with employees from the SkiStarshop division. They described their routines and procedures in SkiStarshop. The collected data was processed and analyzed through our theoretical framework.

The purpose of this thesis is to understand the reasons to why management consultants choose to leave their positions at large and established management consultant companies. The empirical data are made up of eleven interviews with men and women, both management consultants that have left their previous positions as well as a consultant who has chosen to stay with her first company and a representative from one of the large companies active within the management consultant industry. We have used the Job Embeddedness Theory combined with theories about identity, legitimacy, institutional norms and gender in order to understand the thoughts and reasoning behind the management consultants´ resignation. We have found that issues with the work itself and characteristics of the industry prevent the management consultants from being embedded within the management consultant company. Rather, some of the characteristics of the industry such as ?up or out? and the need to constantly perform work as a ?pushing-out mechanism?.