This master thesis concerns whether Swedish non-financial listed firms act in accordance with the optimal capital structure theory and/or pecking order theory. The examined period is 1998-2004 and we discover that Swedish companies neither follow optimal capital structure theory nor pecking order theory. From our results we conclude that there exists no single point of the capital structure which is optimal. Rather it seems as if the optimal point lies in-between an interval from 0 to the industry average, where firms tend to be indifferent to their debt-ratios. Our results show that Swedish companies prefer internal financing followed by equity and as last choice debt issuance..

This master thesis has been written in collaboration with Science Park Jönköping and is based on a problem related to corporate innovation. Science Park Jönköping believes that there is an untapped potential in existing industry in the form of ideas that are never commercialized. These theories are also supported in the research in which other authors have perceived that the ideas and inventions which do not belong to the core business risk ending up in drawers. If more of these ideas could be spin-offs or other forms of enterprise instead of staying in the drawers it would lead to growth, both for companies and for the society in large.The purpose of the thesis work is to, based on the case Science Park Jönköping, analyze how science parks and incubators can support the commercialization of ideas that derive from industry, who otherwise had been left lying. The work began with a mapping of the Science Park Jönköping operations and the skills they possess, and then other initiatives that aim to commercialize more ideas from companies were examined.

Overweight and obesity in children is an extensive and accelerating problem in the western world. The risk factors for overweight are well- known and well-documented. Focus should lie in the prophylactic work in order to prevent overweight and obesity in preschool children. The aim of our study has been to highlight the role of the district nurse in her/his work to prevent overweight and obesity in preschool children. The study was carried out through studies as a literature review.

På uppdrag av SWECO Management AB utreds möjligheten till att kunna se korrelationer mellan åtgärder på en fastighet eller i dess omgivning och ett förändrat fastighetsvärde. Denna information skall vara SWECO till gagn i upphandlingssituationer, för att lättare kunna visa för beställaren om att tjänsten i fråga kan leda till ett ökat fastighetsvärde. Med utgångspunkt i den begränsade litteraturen, har information främst samlats genom en intervjuprocess med representanter från fastighetsbranschen. För att få ett brett perspektiv i ämnet, har representanter med olika befattningar, olika lång erfarenhet och med varierande utbildningar intervjuats. I studien görs avgränsningar om makrofaktorer, såsom konjunktursvängningar, ränteförändringar, finanskriser, låneinstitutens förändrade låneregler etc.

Humans attitudes towards different animals are very complex were culture, genetic, psychology and evolution are some of the factors that influence. The order of animals that can provoke the most intense and extreme attitudes, both positive and negative, are the carnivores. Wolves are a constant debate in Sweden and even though a big part of the population are neutral towards the wolf, a clear friction of the attitudes can be seen. Some factors that have been seen to influence the attitude are age, education and the size of the hometown. The aim of this study is to investigate whether outdoor activities, time spend in rural areas, and time spent in a weekend cottage, also correlate with attitude towards wolf.

During my practical training I have seen what after-school offers children. Large groups of children and little staff, often results in that the children had to play freely until they go home. Few activities are offered to the children and the staff is busy looking after the children and ensures that they are not fighting.The purpose of this study is to find out how children feel about their leisure activities and if they think they are being offered a meaningful leisure. The main research questions were:How do children experience their leisure-time?Do after-school offers children a meaningful leisure and is it the children's interests and needs that govern the activities and the environment?How do the number of children in the leisure group affect the leisure time?The methods to collect data in the study are observations and interviews.

AbstractThe purpose of this paper is to examine the work situation and career opportunities among women police. We use a gender perspective as a guideline during the examination. Despite words of being, and work to create, gender neutral organization, women police is greatly underrepresented. The interviewed women gave a picture of an organization in which they had to work harder than their male colleagues to advance. The biggest problem seems to lie in the hierarchy dominated by male police officers and the fact that women, during pregnancy, are missing out on valuable time at work, and thus, also essential experiences for future career advancement.

The purpose of the thesis is to describe how environmental compensation is carried through when it comes to exploitation of Natura 2000. The thesis also relates to the three theories of planning synoptic, advocacy and transactive. Three cases of environmental compensation have been studied from three different countries where an exploitation of the Natura 2000 is done. Sweden, Germany and the Netherlands have all been working with environmental impact assessments as a demand to be able to carry through their projects. The projects concern the development of a railway track, an industry and a port which all have been approved by the EU-commission to carry on because of socioeconomic reasons.

The change of the Real property index map has met a lot of resistance in Dalarna.This is the reason that the parcel?s reform has not had the same impact in Dalarnaas in the rest of Sweden. In addition, even ?Laga skifte? (the reformation on propertystructure) was never effected in most areas of Dalarna. This has lead to thatDalarna has a unique property structure with many small and narrow parcels.Some argue, however, that the property structure has been the same for many centuries.The purpose of this thesis is therefore to study how the property structurelooked before ?storskifte? (the reformation on property structure) was done, howit was when äganderättsutredningen (the adjudication), in the 1970s, was accomplished,and finally how the structure looks when land consolidation has been implemented.For the template of the studies, seven different villages were chosen.The basis for the study was comprised of acts for each stage and each village.The study showed that change in property structure has occurred.

CSR - "Corporate Social Responsibility" is a concept that in recent years has become of bigger importance for companies. Even at McDonald's, which quickly grew into today's 217 restaurants, with up to 430 000 visitors daily. We have investigated how the McDonald's CSR work has evolved over time, how it looks today and what has influenced this development. Things that have influenced McDonald's and led to their CSR work proved to be scandals and changes in legislations. The PR value of working with CSR has also increased and a lot of the CSR work has shown to be economically viable.

Problemställning: Vilka är de interna samt externa kritiska faktorer som skall tas hänsyn till, vid fastställandet av en Time pacing-rytm?Syfte: Syftet med uppsatsen är att klargöra vilka interna och externa faktorer som är kritiska, av största vikt, för fastställandet av en Time pacing-rytm i ett företag. Dessutom ämnar vi ordna dessa faktorer i en modell som skall hjälpa företag vid fastställandet av rytmen, vid användandet av Time pacing-strategin.Metod: Uppsatsen är genomförd med kvalitativ inriktning, och dess primärdata är inhämtat dels genom intervjuer med externa konsulter, dels genom intervjuer hos fallföretaget.Slutsatser: Vi har utrönt vilka de kritiska faktorerna är som påverkar Time pacing-rytmen. Detta har vi visualiserat i en modell, i vilken vi även rangordnat faktorerna kronologisk gentemot varandra. Således har vi fastslagit att det finns faktorer som är mer kritiska än andra vid fastställandet av rytmen, samt att det går att rangordna dem kronologiskt..

By tradition horses are weaned at an age of 5-6 months. This study illuminates weaned foals misdirected suckling behaviour, which means that they try to suckle another foal. Since no information about this issue is presented, we decided to perform a behaviour study on weaned foals. The misdirected suckling behaviour was studied on a group with 7 foals, with both fillies and colts. In the group the weaning age varied between 147 days and 215 days, and the first time we observed them, they had been separated from the mares for 12 days.

På uppdrag av SWECO Management AB utreds möjligheten till att kunna se korrelationer mellan åtgärder på en fastighet eller i dess omgivning och ett förändrat fastighetsvärde. Denna information skall vara SWECO till gagn i upphandlingssituationer, för att lättare kunna visa för beställaren om att tjänsten i fråga kan leda till ett ökat fastighetsvärde. Med utgångspunkt i den begränsade litteraturen, har information främst samlats genom en intervjuprocess med representanter från fastighetsbranschen. För att få ett brett perspektiv i ämnet, har representanter med olika befattningar, olika lång erfarenhet och med varierande utbildningar intervjuats. I studien görs avgränsningar om makrofaktorer, såsom konjunktursvängningar, ränteförändringar, finanskriser, låneinstitutens förändrade låneregler etc.

Products and services have for a long time competed with their brands. For some time now, cities have begun to compete with each other to attract visitors and other stakeholders to come to their town. It is important that the citizens feel as they are a part of the message that the city sends out in its communication.Cities are today working actively with their brands, much like regular companies, in order to create the profile and image in order to be competitive against other cities and places. Cities and places are part of a dynamic process which includes both positive and negative events. These events might have an impact on the brands, and therefore it is a necessity to be able to react on these events to make the most of positive things and deal with the negative in a way that minimizes the effects on the brand.Citybranding as a research field is quite new.

There are some key elements which distinguish a general operating system, such as Linux, from a Real Time operating system, such as OSE. The later belongs to the category of soft Real Time systems while Linux is a general operating system, with significantly improved real time properties after version 2.6. These improvements make it interesting to compare the two systems.When comparing two operating systems, there are a number of issues which have to be considered. One way to measure the performance of the systems is by studying the time consumption for the same functionality and hardware.During the study, the items that appeared as the most important for the performance of the systems, were: process primitives, system primitives, interprocess communication, context switches and interrupt latency.This work demonstrates that it is possible and reasonable to do performance testing on two different operating systems. The implemented tests cover a number of basic functionalities, which appeared to be the most crucial ones for the performance of the systems..