The number of firms adapting the concept of Corporate Social Responsibility is constantly growing. It is no longer enough only to supply your customers with demanded products and services since todays? customers have an increased awareness and are demanding more transparence when it comes to the Manufacturing and responsibility for society.Along with a growing interest in social, ethical and environmental matters, many firms have received critique, consequently forcing them to start taking more responsibility for their activities. The clothing industry was among the first to get critized and therefore early in starting their work with CSR.The purpose of this paper is to investigate how firms in the clothing industry work with CSR today, and also how they choose to communicate this work, both internally and externally. The methodology of the paper is qualitative and aims to deeply investigate four different firms, along with an additional interview with a CSR-consult from one of the leading communication-firms in Sweden.The theoretical foundation includes a frame of reference around CSR and the communication thereof, and also a few relevant theories around CSR and business ethics.After analyzing the empirical material the paper have reached a few conclusions.

Examensarbetet har bedrivits vid Tekniska Högskolan i Jönköping och i samarbete med fallföretaget Solutions for Tomorrow AB. Arbetet har utformats efter ett syfte; att utveckla ett produktkoncept där alternativa material och tillverkningsmetoder leder till kostnadsbesparingar. Syftet har sedan brutits ned till fyra frågeställningar som arbetet kretsar kring. Två frågeställningar behandlar redan framtagna koncept och två rör ekonomiska aspekter för nya projekt. För att besvara frågeställningarna är arbetet utformat som en konceptstudie där hela utvecklingsprocessen har genomförts.

This thesis describes the work process and the results for the development of a newkind of ergonomic cleaning mop, ranging from basic concept to a virtually productionready digital prototype. The project was made in cooperation with, Ömer Altun, whowas also the project supervisor, and whose plan it is to launch this new product onthe market in a foreseeable future. The mop is meant to be used by both professionalcleaning staff and ordinary home users. What makes this product unique is that it hasa movable center piece that simplifies the cleaning under low furniture.The work began with the establishment of a product requirements specification andlater a study of similar products and existing functional models was conducted. Afterthese surveys the work began with refining the existing concepts in order to makethem more complete.

The master thesis, conducted at Metrima AB, concerns the development of a non-intrusivedistribution meter as a basis for individual tap water billing in apartments.The project is conducted in response to the market interest in individual tap water billing inapartments as an answer to environmental concerns regarding water consumption. Due to thehigh installation cost of traditional water meters, a new method of determining waterconsumption, without having to cut water pipes, is proposed.The proposed method distributes the total water consumption for an apartment complex toindividual apartments according to distribution meters, measuring water run-time, in eachapartment. The water run-time is estimated by measuring the water pipe?s outward vibrationsand temperature changes.A test environment was established and a prototype built, using a tilt- and vibration sensor forvibration sensing and a precision temperature sensor to measure temperature changes. As bothsensors work well in the test environment, further testing was done in 3 apartments for aduration of 5 days.

When a company seeks to enter a new market, the multiple choices of possible new business relationships exist. Further, establishing new relationships is a time-consuming procedure associated with high uncertainty and high costs. Hence, if the firm does not succeed in pinpointing the most suitable business partners to collaborate with, the firm may both forfeit other possible good relationships, as well as resources invested. Based on this notion the aim of this thesis is to explore how a Manufacturing company can base the selection of future dealership Business-to-Business partners by evaluating indicators of a possible business relationship?s potential to become successful. The choice of focusing on the Business-to-Business relationship between a manufacturer and a dealership company originates from being influenced by the issues facing the Swedish agricultural machinery manufacturer Väderstad-Verken AB, who is putting attention to explore the US market.

ADORABLE CHILD OF ITS TIMEThis text will describe a inovative project about material, traditions and someideas about furniture for work in an home inviroment. The content is partlyabout exploring ancient marine- and textile techniques to find somethinguseful for furniture of the twenty first century. It is also about the designprocess of creating a sustainable piece of furniture that questions the paradigmathicsabout usage and the context about Manufacturing furniture.The text will briefly describe the design process and then reason about theresult in a deeper sense. Questions that has been considered from the verybeginning of the project as well as those one stumbled across during theevolution of the work will be objectives for the discussion. The result will bein focus as a foundation for the discussion and also the values and issuesabout that.

The project, Flexible Snowboard System, has been carried out by the project group independently and is a module developed for snowboarders, ski rentals and ski schools. The problems of today?s solutions are that they cause the user an inconvenient standing position when riding the ski lift or skating the transportation slope, also mounting, adjustments and disassembling of the bindings are time consuming and brings undesired wear to the screws and screw holes. In addition any adjustments require that the user steps out of the bindings and have tools at hand. Flexible Snowboard System is a universal module which means that it can be assembled with all of today?s snowboards and bindings.

The working capital describes the short-term financial position and focus on cash flow and the actual inflow and outflow of money in the company. Working capital is part of the company's financing and consists of the company's current assets and current liabilities. There are resources that are used in the daily activity and can be optimized. The more effective they are in circulation, the higher value they create. The control of working capital is called Working Capital Management and has its basis in the company?s Working Capital Policy.

The company Olofsfors AB manufactures drive belts for forest machinery, known as ECO-Tracks, and abrasion-resistant steel and cutting edges for graders, excavators and tractors, known as Bruxite and SharqEdges. Manufacturing these products requires the steel to be heated and molded, then submerged in water and hardened. The water used in the hardening of steel is pumped to the process from pits below the floor and then pumped back to the pit after it?s been used. Since the temperature of this water rises after being used to harden the steel the temperature of the pumping pit needs to be adjusted to maintain its setpoint of 21°C.

This report deals with an exam report written by Olle Hjalmarsson and Thomas Likar, students at Högskolan i Halmstad. The project was carried out for Haldex Traction AB in Landskrona whose business consist of Manufacturing automatic all wheel drive systems (AWD-system). These systems consist of a plate clutch which activates all four wheels of a 4-wheel driven vehicle. An important component in these clutches is the accumulator which basically consists of a piston under the load of a spring which creates an oil pressure with the help of an electric motor used for actuating the clutch.At Haldex difficulties has been experienced regarding the assembly of the accumulator parts due to the small tolerances between the piston and the hole of the accumulator in the cast aluminium housing. Attempts have been made to assemble the parts in existing robot cells.

For a long time Lean has been a well-known concept among manufacturers. Theinterest of understanding Lean and the ability to implement it is common amongcompanies. The concept of Lean, used in the right way, can help companies to reducetheir lead times, their complexity and increase the efficiency of the working processes(Hyer och Wemmerlöv, 2002). Unfortunately the work towards increased efficiencyhas primarily been focused on Manufacturing and plant work, resulting in that Leanhas been adjusted to these areas. The conclusion of this is that companies don´tprioritize to improve processes such as administrative ones.

AbstractThis master thesis was performed at Scania transmission department in Södertälje, where the Manufacturing of gears is done. Today a large amount of manual handling is performed between the machining and the hardening process. Most of the manual handling is done at the heat treatment department. The purpose of this master thesis is to give a suggestion on how to reduce or eliminate the manual handling at the heat treatment department. The possibility to use the same packaging throughout the processes will also be investigated.

The world gets smaller and smaller and goods, services, people and information are nowadays more and more able to freely cross borders. Half of the Swedish GNP consists of export and almost 70 % of that amount is goods. Because of today?s increasing globalization the Swedish companies are now faced with both new opportunities and threats. Companies with goods which are manufactured in Sweden gets challenged by increased competition from cheap goods produced in other countries and companies can no longer afford to entirely focus on the domestic market.

This thesis is performed as a summarizing project for the mechanical engineering education at School of Engineering in Jönköping. All knowledge necessary to complete this thesis was gathered from previous courses and education.This project was to develop a new product for the company TR Equipment AB in Tranås. The new product is going to be based on an already existing product, TR 1700. TR 1700 is a bathtub equipped with a height adjustable function. This product is used in retirement homes and in the care of disabled people.

AbstractThis master thesis was performed at Scania transmission department in Södertälje, where the Manufacturing of gears is done. Today a large amount of manual handling is performed between the machining and the hardening process. Most of the manual handling is done at the heat treatment department. The purpose of this master thesis is to give a suggestion on how to reduce or eliminate the manual handling at the heat treatment department. The possibility to use the same packaging throughout the processes will also be investigated.