Probiotics is a special group of health products on the market. The most common type of  these is live cultures of lactic acid fermenting bacteria from raw milk . These include, among others, yogurt and various trademarks such as Hälsofil ®, Acidophilus ®, Dofilus ® and Kefir ®. Such products are often used by patients who are treated with antibiotics to combat the intestinal flora eliminated, thus causing digestive problems. The present work deals with yet another type of health product, viz.

ABB Capacitors is looking to introduce LEAN within their organization. The purpose of this research is to suggest ways to improve the production planning in order to facilitate the company?s production processes. This should be done in accordance with the LEAN concept.Today, ABB will produce two of the customers? orders at the same time.

The Innovation- and Design Engineer program at Karlstad university is a three year long engineer education. In the last phase a final piece is to be done and in this case Boda Borg in Skellefteå is the company in need of product development. Boda Borg is a company in the experience industry and they are located in nine cities from Gällivare in the north of Sweden to Karlskrona in the south. Boda Borg is a franchise company where every facility is their own. As a visitor you will experience physical challenges as well as intellectual in adventure rooms which are serial linked.

The globalization of today?s society has enabled consumers to acquire products and services from all over the world. Global organizations have the entire world as a playfield and offer products and services across markets. Regardless perception and transparency of the global market, consumers are still individuals. Consumers may have different perceptions and ideas about products, their functions and usage.

Det pågår ett intensivt utvecklingsarbete inom byggsektorn, för att komma tillrätta med problem som resursslöseri i byggandet och dålig produktivitetstillväxt jämfört med övrig tillverkningsindustri. Det industriella byggandet ligger i gränslandet mellan traditionellt byggande och tillverkningsindustri och försöker närma sig lösningar för vissa av de konstaterade problem som finns inom byggsektorn, bland annat genom anammande av de produktionsmetoder som varit drivande i utvecklingen inom tillverkningsindustrin, exempelvis Lean Production.Fallföretaget i den här studien, Moelven ByggModul AB i Sandsjöfors (Moelven), har lång erfarenhet av industriellt byggande och hade 2010 börjat införa vissa Lean-verktyg i sin produktionsprocess. Den här studien inducerades av Moelvens önskemål att kartlägga och problematisera sitt system för materialhantering, för att bättre kunna organisera sina materialflöden till montageplatsen. Studiens syfte är att beskriva problembilden för Moelvens materialhantering och utvärdera hur förbättringsåtgärderna, baserade på en Lean förbättringsstrategi, inverkat på problembilden över tid.Studien genomfördes som en kvalitativ fallstudie i två delar, vars första del utfördes under 2010 och andra del under hösten 2014. Genom observationer, intervjuer och litteraturstudier inhämtades material för att kartlägga och analysera Moelvens materialhantering genom byggprocessen vid de två tidpunkterna.

Handling product returns has become a critical activity for organizations as the volume of gods flowing back through the supply chain rapidly increases. Few research studies have published specific empirical data concerning the reverse logistics practices of companies. Information technology and information support has long been recognized as a competitive weapon ? capable of enhancing company performance and achieving efficient reverse logistics. Reverse logistics is very unlike the forward, as it is more reactive and also has less visibility.

Tile covered bathrooms require a wellexecuted waterproofing in order toprotect the underlying construction frommoisture. Länsforsakringar Uppsala paysannually out millions in insurance fordamages related to poor waterproofedbathrooms. In recent years, SP (SwedishNational Testing and Research Institute)investigated and researchedwaterproofing products, resulting ingreater shortcomings of product defectsthan expected.This report raises the problemsconcerning waterproofing and discusseswhy they occur. By studying productinstructions and insurance cases anddamage reports provided byLänsforsakringar, the most commonproblems concerning bathroomwaterproofing where concluded. Animportant part of the report was tofind out the actual cause to whywaterproofing damages occur.The results of the survey indicate thata common cause of water damage usuallyis related to poor productinstallations.

The Innovation- and Design Engineer program at Karlstad university is a three year long engineer education. In the last phase a final piece is to be done and in this case Boda Borg in Skellefteå is the company in need of product development. Boda Borg is a company in the experience industry and they are located in nine cities from Gällivare in the north of Sweden to Karlskrona in the south. Boda Borg is a franchise company where every facility is their own. As a visitor you will experience physical challenges as well as intellectual in adventure rooms which are serial linked.

Till följd av globalisering och en växande konkurrens ställs det i dag allt större krav på organisationer. För att möta den hårdnande konkurrensen är det vanligt att företag implementerar olika kvalitetsprogram. Dessa förändringar ses som nödvändiga åtgärder för att kunna bibehålla marknadsandelar och vara konkurrenskraftiga. Genom att införa Lean-verktyg och arbeta med ständiga förbättringar minskar riskerna för att produktionen läggs ned eller flyttas till lågkostnadsländer.Som examensarbete har författarna valt att studera ett av dessa Lean-verktyg som används för ställtidsreducering. Verktyget benämns SMED och står för ?Single Minute Exchange of Die? vilket syftar till att öka maskintillgängligheten genom effektivare verktygsbyte mellan olika produkter.

I och med det enorma användningsområdet av datorsystem i dagens samhälle finns många typer av användare och uppgifter att designa för. Genom designriktlinjer kan utvecklare få referenser och guidning för att skapa användbara applikationer från början. På så vis kan tid sparas i utvecklingsprocessen. Från och med puberteten då människan kan anses vara vuxen ändras förmåga till andraspråksinlärning, trots detta finns det människor som lär sig andraspråk i vuxen ålder. Kunskap kring vad dessa skillnader beror på måste användas i designen av en andraspråksinlärningsapplikation för att tillgodose människans kognitiva förmågor.

Through a sociocultural perspectivethe purpose of this study is to investigate how preschool teachers look at quality development in preschool and how they perceive their participation in this development.I have used a qualitative method based on five interviews with preschool teachers from three different parts of Sweden. I used an interview guide with open questions. The interview answers were categorized in themes based on the responses which were most frequent. In the result I have been using an analysis based on these themes. The result showed that the preschool teachers consider that the leadership style affects their work.

The aim of this study is to investigate how employees in consulting companies develop their competence in order to perform their daily work. The focus is on informal competence development. The theoretical framework consists of theories concerning learning and competence development in working life, theories on organizational change and evaluation, a well as professional reflection. The methods applied are narrative research and interviews based on the assumption that knowledge about reality is only obtainable through language and communication.The main results show that competence is developed through experience, social interaction, communication and dialog with co-workers and customers. The post-modern conceptions of the rapid (technical) development and need to be up-to-date has a strong hold on the informants apprehension of working life, as does the notion of not having enough time for all the competence development they would like.

Package design constitutes an important marketing and differentiation tool in an increasingly competitive food market, particularly in the category of daily consumer goods where the turnover rate is high and the purchases are based on self-service (Hine, 1997; Spethmann, 1994; Underwood, 1999). Media fragmentation undermines the traditional marketing tools and the demands for packaging are bigger than ever. A package must not only sell a product, but also tell, through design, how the product is used and express the values that the trademark owner wishes to convey to the end customer (Underwood, 1998). The understanding of the role of packaging as a marketing tool has increased, but the initiators inside the packaging industry in Sweden still think that the Swedish packaging industry is developing slowly. They often describe Swedish packages as homogeneous and unimaginative.

During the last decade working with competence has emerged as a more strategically important area. Today the human resources in a company are considered a competitive advance and the HR-units play a significant role when it comes to HR-management. Different motives for investing in strategies that promote competence development and learning also exist. The purpose of this paper was to examine how the process of competence development was managed at a large global company. The empirical material consisted of four persons who were interviewed and the analysis of the material was inspired by grounded theory.From the analysis four major themes or core factors emerged as central to the interviewed persons' understanding of the competence development process; solid preparatory work in relation to competence development, communication, awareness of responsibilities and finally the taking action and evaluation of the action.

Abstract Title: Enabling Smart Research and Development through Knowledge Conversation Seminar date: 2005-06-08 Course: Master thesis in business administration, 10 Swedish credits (15 ECTS) Authors: Andreas Johnsson, Johan Rosendahl Advisors: Lars Bengtsson Key words: Knowledge management, Knowledge conversation, Research and development, Ba, Trelleborg Purpose: The purpose of the thesis is to create a model that shows how knowledge management aimed at research and development processes can be used and how the theoretical fields can be connected. Methodology: The thesis is based on abductive perspective where empirical and theoretical material has been mixed to create a foundation for the analysis. Theoretical perspectives: Theories concerning knowledge management and research and development have primarily been used. These have been complemented with material about team structures and incentive systems. Empirical foundation: The empirical material is based on semi structured, mostly qualitative interviews and strictly quantitative inquiries performed at Industrial Hose within the Trelleborg group.