Convective snowbands is a weather phenomenon that is associated with heavy snowfall in a limited area. They are formed over ice-free parts of e.g. the Baltic Sea when there is a cold easterly airflow over relatively warm water. These convective snowbands can cause large amounts of snow along the Swedish east coast, often causing traffic hazards. Sometimes they can even paralyze an entire community.  In this study, convective snowbands that have formed over the Baltic Sea during the period 1980-2009 are examined, in order to find out how often they occur, what place they are most common and in what month they usually appear.

The purpose of this thesis is to outline an appropriate model in order for companies to successfully act and compete physically as wholesalers at the same time as acting on the virtual market by selling directly to the end consumer. The approach of this thesis is hermeneutical and abductive with elements of hypothetically deductive approach. Our research has a qualitative research strategy based on case studies and interviews as well as on secondary data. Interviews were conducted with the case company JaymJay Wear AB as well as with other companies, so called mini cases. The secondary data consists mainly of textbooks, web sites and journals.

Background and problem - Integrated reporting is a hot topic today and is predicted to be the future of companies? external reporting. In December 2013 a new framework on integrated reporting was released and one part of the framework concerns governance and how it supports the organization?s value creation. A recent study on integrated reporting in Sweden showed the area of governance to be poorly reported.

The IT industry is constantly evolving and requires everyone working with website development to be updated on the latest methods. The web grows larger every day, and more visits are carried out by mobile devices. It is more important than ever for companies to have updated and functional pages that can be used on different platforms. We want to find out how common it is for IT departments and web agencies to embrace the newest technology and also what it takes to get them to move from one technology to another. Responsive web design is a constantly growing new technique that helps web developers developing for different platforms.

Since the disintegration of the Soviet Union a lot of hope has been put on civil society to help develop Russia into a more democratic society. This study explores the constructive elements in the relationship between civil society and the state in Russia, and how this enables the work toward political development. By using Julie Fishers theory about political development and organisational autonomy I discuss the varying and often complex ways in which civil society and the state interacts. These are often not mentioned in the liberal tradition, which believes that civil society's most important democratic function is to act as a watchdog for the state.There is very limited political space for NGO's in authoritative Russia. The existing oppositional NGO's are important for the political development, but they are few and their impacts on society are limited.

This paper seeks to investigate whether there is a positive relationship between bonus as a part of total executive compensation and lower accounting quality among Swedish companies. In this study, accounting quality is defined as the degree by which a company's earnings are subject to earnings management. To detect earnings management accrual-based modified Jones model is applied to companies listed on the Large-, Mid- and Small-Cap lists on the Stockholm stock exchange during 2011. We find a statistically significant positive relationship between bonus as a part of total executive compensation and lower accounting quality. Thus, in line with prior research, our results suggest that managers, interested in maximizing their bonus, will select income increasing accruals to manage earnings upwards.

Asset management in insurance companies differs from conventional asset management to the extent that respect has to be taken to both assets and the commitments the insurance company has towards its customers. A model that has proven to fit well regarding the matching of assets and liabilities is the Asset Liability Management Model (ALM model). In addition to the matching in the balance sheet, the ALM model can be used in a company's work with strategic portfolio allocation by applying it as a basis for analyzing investment strategies with expected risk and return. From this, the ALM model also becomes relevant for calculating key figures according to the legal framework Solvens II which includes laws and regulations regarding the demands on economical strength (solvens) of insurance companies.Hence, the goal of this masters thesis has been to, on behalf of Bliwa Livförsäkring, create an ALM model to support the asset management department of Bliwa in their work with defining a credible way of analyzing the future risk and return of Bliwa's asset portfolio and insurance undertakings.The ALM model generally consist of four submodels, the scenario model, the liability model, the asset model and the company model, where the scenario model often is named as the core of the ALM model. The course of action has been to develop these submodels individually, with focus on the scenario model.

Information handling has been a key issue for different companies for a long time. Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) is used to transfer different business documents from one company to another. This is done in such way that the information itself is separated from how this information is stored and handled in the companies internal systems. As different companies have different systems there is a need for a standardised format for this exchange. There is a big difference between EDI-systems based on what kind of EDI-standard is used. The most common standard in Europe is EDIFACT, but with increased interest of using the Internet for business communication there is a need for a standard that is adjusted for use over the Internet.

The contact company, LRF Konsult, is a consulting firm specialized in areas of law, real estate, finance and taxation. Discussions on the subject of agricultural improvement in the area of Lean, has primarily been driven by the Royal Swedish Academy of Agriculture and Forestry, where LRF Konsult also participated. This thesis can be seen as a preliminary study of how Lean can work within agricultural enterprises.The thesis primarily focuses on the possibilities dairy farms have to improve operations. What practical benefits they can obtain through the implementation of Lean. And how an implementation could take place.By visits to two dairy companies, and through interviewing their respective business leaders, an image of the companies activity for improvement, in connection to this thesis was established.

Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) is a quality control system created by the European Union (EU) to protect integrity of certain food and drinks that are produced in a specific area in a unique way. By protecting these products, the EU can certify that the traditional region-specific methods of food and drink production are preserved. The EU countries that follow such a system are mostly from Southern Europe. For instance in France, the PDO system has helped improve the income for farmers, boosted the rural development and assured protection for farmers against the abuse of their brand and the selling of their products by outsiders. In Sweden, there are no PDO products yet, instead there is Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) and Traditional Speciality Guarantee (TSG) that are not as protective as PDO.

Title: Social Media ? And customer interaction in smaller firmsSeminar date: 2011-06-10Course: Information Logistics, D-level.Authors: Marie Stenhammar and Ulrika CarlssonAdvisor: Jaime CamposKey words: Social Media, Web 2.0, Co-creation, Viral marketing, Word of Mouth, smaller firmsPurpose: This paper aims to describe the relevance of social media to smaller firms, the challenges and opportunities they face and what strategies they use, in the interaction with their customers.Methodology: The study is qualitative in nature and has an abductive approach. The empirical material consists of in-depth interviews with chosen companies and Internet observations.Theoretical perspectives: Social Media, Web 2.0, Co-creation, Viral marketing, Word of MouthEmpirical foundation: The study takes its empirical base from in-depth interviews with representatives from the small companies and internet observations connected to these.Conclusions: Smaller companies have great interest in social media. They preferably use Facebook, blogs, YouTube and Twitter. Their strategy is mainly to be very active and update their social media regularly.

The environment has become an important part in people´s lives, and in today´s society stakeholders demands have increased upon companies when it comes to sustainability reports. How these sustainability reports are designed depends on whom it?s for, laws and regulations, and the companies own norms and values. The purpose of sustainability reports is to measure, monitor and compare a company´s enviromental impact. It?s not only about integrating economics, but also enviromental and social standards together to get both financial and competitive advantages.Sustainable Value method is a new model and is the first real method that can be used to evaluate a company´s resources, both financial, social and enviromental to a sustainable value.This model is used to compare the resource efficiency between companies.In this thesis, a documentary study with an experimental approach has been made.Sustainability reports from six selected companies (in the engineering and forestry sector) have been investigated with respect to their accounting for carbon dioxide, and an experiment using the method ?Sustainable Value Approach? was subsequently performed.

Companies constantly strive for the perfect order which enables them to satisfy and retain their customers. This is a difficult process that can be facilitated by using different picking technologies. In this study, a research of the picking technologies Pick-to-Light and Pick-to-Voice have been made to investigate when each technology is suited.In order to collect relevant information and data to be able to answer the question formulation, a qualitative study with interviews have been made. The purpose of this essay was to investigate Pick-to-Light and Pick-to-Voice to see when each technology is best suited and to see what the differences between the technologies are. With our essay we wanted to help manufacturing companies to make the right decisions when implementing a picking technology.The results showed that those picking technologies give companies a higher picking quality and an increased work efficiency since the order picking is faster to perform, and that picking errors are reduced.

This paper, Personal safety when working with weather encapsulation constructions, is focused on weather encapsulation constructions and how the absence of Swedish standards and regulations is affecting the safety for the workers. The usage of weather encapsulation construction is increasing in Sweden therefore the needs for standards and regulations are becoming more and more urgent. The risks involving the rising and the demolition of the weather encapsulation construction and when the construction is transported along its rails are treated in the paper. Since there are no regulations companies have had to solve the safety issues without instructions, the paper regards how the companies have solved this problem without the support of formal institutions..

 The purpose of this essay is to analyze and understand which difficulties that e-company's struggles with the most, and what their strategies are to overcome this problem. Sales of clothing through e-commerce have made the shopping experience faster and more comfortable, but on the other hand it has created a couple of problems which makes a big difference in the purchase of clothing, we are partly talking about the absence of the testing opportunity. To not know whether or not the shirt or pants will fit, leads customers to a game of gamble every single time they purchase a garment. Another problem which makes customers nervous before a purchase is the absence of a physical salesperson. This might lead customers to question whether or not the company exists.