Sammanfattning Utvecklingen och utbredningen av Leveraged buyouts förvärv har ökat i Sverige de senaste 5-15 åren, detta kan vara ett resultat av ett mer flöde på kapital och intresse av att investera. Dessutom har förmodligen den allt mer mogna private equity marknad tillsammans med det ökande behovet av effektivisering av bolagen bidragit till att allt fler förvärv sker med belånat kapital. Vi har i denna kvalitativa uppsats intervjuat tre private equity företag med syfte att försöka klargöra vilka investeringskriterier som ligger till grund för en leveraged buyout-transaktion, samt vilka branscher som lockar dessa private equity företagen. I slutsatsen har det framkommit att PE-företagen gör investeringar i mogna företag utan några preferenser på specifika branscher. Vidare har vi funnit att de två viktigaste faktorer som PE-företagen tar i beaktning vid investeringar är stabila kassaflöden och kompetent företagsledning i målbolagen..

Private individuals can voluntarily buy EU Allowances (EUA) in order to remove them from the European Union Greenhouse Gas Emission Trading System (EU ETS). It leads to progressive reduction of total carbon dioxide emissions in Europe. Kalmar Energi offers customers to obtain one EUA (equivalent to one ton of CO2) per year by paying 25 SEK a month as a KlimatEl-supplement. The purpose of this research is to examine the customers? attitudes in the issue of climate compensation and trying to define the reasons behind their choices.The results of the quantitative questionnaire were analyzed by using descriptive and analytical statistical methods and have shown some correlation between customers? ages and decisions to accept or not the offer of KlimatEl.

MPC is the company Exova Metech?s operating system that contains all the information needed for the company's objectives and guidelines to permeate the company. How changes in the MPC should be communicated with the company's employees can be seen as problematic. Routines that have been changed in practice, the process owners do not always update in the MPC, it leads to that the employees can not ensure that duties are performed properly. It is therefore important that management takes its responsibility by providing updated information.

The study has shown that retailers in the mid-price segment differentiate their brand through developing a strong company identity around the brand. The personality involves store atmosphere, merchandise and advertising. Larger companies have chosen to lay the responsibility on management level, which facilitates on store level. By controlling the strategies on a central level the company can make sure that the stores are steered in the direction that the company wants them to be steered in, and also that they follow the positioning-concept. The company can also devote its efforts to working with its core value, which is service.

Having the right executive group is vital for the success of a company. The complex context, in which the company operates, makes it difficult to create a well functioning and high performing group. This study aims to investigate how the executive group should be composed in terms of externally and internally recruited people, in order to take full advantage of the positive aspects associated with each one. Furthermore, we will discuss why and when a company chooses to recruit people to the executive group either externally or internally..

Titel: Private equity-ägande och dess ekonomiska konsekvenser hos portföljbolagBakgrund: Det finns omstridda resultat inom den akademiska världen när det gäller vilka ekonomiska konsekvenser private equity-ägande leder till. Olika studier har kommit fram till att private equity-ägda portföljbolag både över- och underpresterar gentemot jämförbara företag. Skillnaderna i studiernas resultat tycks påverkas av vilken marknad som studien är utförd på. Detta då studier som är gjorda på marknader med spridd ägarkoncentration tenderar att visa på att private equity-ägande leder till positiva ekonomiska konsekvenser och tvärtom på marknader med koncentrerat ägande. Tidigare studier har också valt att fokusera på att studera private equity-ägda portföljbolag under högkonjunktur eller under både hög- och lågkonjunktur, det finns således till vår kännedom ingen tidigare studie som isolerar sin studie till att endast inkludera lågkonjunktur, vilket understryker relevansen av denna studie.Syfte: Syftet med denna uppsats är att genom en empirisk analys avgöra om och vilka ekonomiska konsekvenser PE-ägande får hos portföljbolag under en lågkonjunktur på den svenska marknaden som präglas av hög ägarkoncentration.Metod: Denna studie har en deduktiv ansats där fokus ligger på teorier som berör private equity-bolags applicering av strategiska och organisatoriska förändringar hos portföljbolag.

The purpose of this study is to gain increased understanding of managers´ attitudes and knowledge about its role in the internal organizational communication. We want to understand how managers define dialogue and further understand the role that dialogue plays for managers. We want to see whether the different managers highlight some common foundations or differences in the dialogue. With the help of the following two questions we wish to understand managers´ relationship to the dialogue within the internal organizational communication: -What meaning does the dialogue have for managers in the private sector?-What role does the dialogue play in the internal organizational communication according to these managers? We use qualitative interviews as the data collection method of our material. Using material from the interviews and mainly in accordance with William Isaacs? theory of dialogue, wecan answer our questions. The result shows that managers' views on the dialogue in many cases are similar to Isaacs? vision but differs in part. The managers believe that employees are there to contribute to the company.

The purpose of this study is to see how adolescent students in high school formulate their thoughts of death and if a belief in transcendent existence affects their thoughts. The study was done on two separate schools, one municipal school and one private religious school, in minor cities in Sweden. The method used was qualitative inquiries and the amount of participants was four from each school, eight in total. The result of the study showed that six out of eight participants had a belief of a transcendent existence, three from the municipal school and three from the religious private school. The result also showed that the participants from the municipal school that had a belief in an transcendent existence also had a belief in a form of ?afterlife?, this was however not reflected on the students in the religious private school where result showed that one out of four had a belief in a form of ?afterlife? and three view death as the final stage of existence..

With increased globalization more companies are sending their employees abroad in order for the company?s survival on the market. Many studies in the field of International Business describe unsuccessful foreign assignments and the importance of intercultural support regarding expatriation. Due to the fact that company X is an international organization we found an interest in studying how the company handles their expatriation process in Sweden. This became the purpose of our study.

The world is facing huge challenges to overcome the climate crisis. A contributing actor to the environmental footprints are the textile industry and their production processes, which highlights the importance to act. The purpose of this study is therefore to investigate how a middle size company's purchase- and design department work to contribute to sustainable fashion and sustainable consumption. As well as to examine the challenges and possibilities that the fashion company faces in its sustainability work. The qualitative study has been prepared and is based on 15 interviews with employees in the purchase- and design department.

Many grocery stores have products marked whit there private brands. The information about these brands is poor. We wanted to find out what the stores own brands stand for and what the manager of purchase thinks it stands for. We choose to concentrate on meat and cured meat and limit our study to ICA, Axfood and Coop because they are the three main actors in the Swedish branch of grocery. The supplier has traditionally manufactured products and made there own brands. These products have been distributed and sold to the consumer thru stores.

In the media world today it is important for TV-companies to differentiate since the number  of competitors has increased. The competition is more complex today because of the  possibility to broadcast throughout satellite and cable. As a company you need a strong brand  in order to differentiate the company from the competitors. The brand of media companies are  set by the content of the offer, which means that the program and the people connected to the  television program has an importance for the sake of how people experience the company. For  a commercial TV channel the content is also important because it attracts the viewers and as a  consequence, also attracts the advertisers.

By identifying effects that a buyout-firm has on management control systems in its portfolio companies, the aim of this thesis is to explain how such effects differs between the companies and finally to explain why the effects differs even though the companies are owned by the same buyout-firm. The study is conducted as a qualitative case study based on interviews with representatives from the studied buyout-firm and three of its portfolio companies.By analyzing the empirical findings with frameworks and theories within management control systems and value creation, we cannot only identify effects that are common for all portfolio companies but we can also observe differences between the portfolio companies.The identified effects that are common for all portfolio companies are: increased internal reporting burden, increased perceived risk of getting laid off among managers and co-workers and replacement of the board immediately after acquisition.The effects that are observed only for two portfolio companies are: increased focus on short-term planning, higher financial targets, replacement of company management upon acquisition and moving of decision authorities to higher organizational levels. Differences are observed although the portfolio companies are owned by the same buyout-firm due to: differences in management and co-workers equity stake in the portfolio companies, differences in business complexity and differences in planned exit-horizon..

The Swedish pharmacy market will be re-regulated in July 2009 which will present private actors with an opportunity to enter the market. Several risks and uncertainties are associated with such an entry. The purpose of this thesis is to increase the understanding of identification and management of risks and uncertainties associated with entering the Swedish pharmacy market. We also intend to investigate similarities and differences in risk identification and risk management as well as create an understanding of the underlying reasons for these similarities and differences. Three companies interested in entering the market have been interviewed and the interviews were conducted with an open approach to avoid influencing the companies? answers.

The object for this study is a company developing and manufacturing vehicles for heavy transportation. The company distributes their products on a global market. Therefore the company is required to have efficient internal production development processes in order to successfully beat the competition. The purpose of this master thesis is to study how this particular company intends to implement their standardized theoretical product development process within their organization and how well it is done. We intend to identify and specify if the process has any unexploited capacity.