Product development cycles become shorter and shorter. The time from idea to market has become an important competitive factor. Despite this, methods used for making the product development process faster are surrounded with uncertainty about their efficiency. The purpose of the thesis is to describe the pros and cons of ?best practice? methods for shortening lead times and how these methods effect the lead times in research and development.

This is a degree project performed at Halmstad University in Sweden on the subject carpet ofreinforcement. This project is developed in association with Celsa Steel Service in Halmstad.The purpose of this report is to investigate how much time that can be saved if carpet ofreinforcement is used instead of the traditional way to work with reinforcement and seewhat kind of parameters that is important between the choices. We are also going to seehow this product affects the situation for reinforcement workers from an ergonomic point ofview.Carpet of reinforcement is made by straight reinforcement?s bars that are welded togetherwith steel bands. These rolls are made at a factory with a machine that welds together thebars in determined centre distance, with desired dimensions after the constructionengineers? blueprints.

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.

Academic research concerning how to determine the power situation in a supply chain where an investment product supplier is involved did not exist. Therefore new models has been developed that analyses the power relations and maps out the power situation in a supply chain. In the future these models can be applied on similar cases by modifying the included parameters. The new models show that case company FAS should focus on the big producers of garbage bag which are Trioplast, Rullpack and Miljösäck. By strengthen the brand FAS can make more money in these relations.

The Swedish consumer electronic industry has recently experienced an increasingly intensive price war. The price war has forced some operators in the business to declare bankruptcy, as the only way to compete has been by driving down prices. A challenge that retail chains in the consumer electronics industry is facing is to increase their margins. If store personnel can success with upselling, the companies will increase their profits. The purpose of this paper is to examine if the sales people in the consumer electronic industry can influence the customer to buy a more expensive product and what the effects the upselling has on the customers' attitudes.

AbstractTitle: To Market a Company with the Help of Nationality ? A study in how marketing and branding works and is being perceived when it focuses on nationalityAuthor: Frida HanssonSubject: Media and Communication Studies CPeriod: Fall semester 2010Length: 38 pagesTutor: Else NygrenAim: Companies and various corporations are always on the hunt for the next big thing in marketing. One idea to market themselves and give them a chance to separate themselves from the cluster of companies aspiring to take your costumers away could be to market themselves with nationality. To investigate why and how some company?s chose to market themselves with nationality, and also study how this kind of marketing is being perceived by customers and non ?costumers.

During the last year there has been a globalization of trade. Because of the development ofmore sophisticated information's - and communication technology the boundaries and thephysical distance have been smeared out between company as well as countries. Furthermoreit generates that many companies have restructured to global value chains. Because of theincreased access the marketplace has become harder and more competitive than ever.Since the customers nowadays have more access to product information the consume patternsand behaviour has been changed. Through the increased knowledge the consumers requiresmore of the products.

This thesis is basically a design project aimed to find a safe and reliable automatic safety device, which is designed to be suitable for highly automated industrial situations. This device fits with ABB / Jokab Safety?s fence systems. These are built up around machines to create safety distances. The automatic protection device assist the operator in situations when loading or going in and out of the danger zone.

In this project a washing station has been constructed for Albany International AB. At present, there is no existing system to clean the dirty pipes that are coming back to the company.The work followed the product development process, and it started with the requirements list. This was followed by brainstorming, evaluation and completion.The result was a concept for de present time and one concept for the future.The present concept is intended to be built immediately. This is an adjustable bench with sliding bearings to facilitate the work. The actual cleaning is done with a high pressure washer that uses hot water.

Due to an increasing global market with a growing competition and an escalating technologydevelopment the demands on companies today are increasing. To maximise the output fromtheir recourses they need to be more efficient. The research on product development and how toensure the efficiencies in the process are extensive and companies could by adapting andimplementing the result of this research use its benefits.This master thesis is made for Knightec AB with the aims that through interviews anddiscussions with three companies investigate, collate, justify and give proposals for productdevelopment process together with supporting methods and procedures for technical projectmanagement. Besides Knightec AB three other companies located in Sweden has beenparticipating in this study. Through semi structured interviews and discussions in focus groupsinformation from the three involved companies were obtained.

In this study it was investigated if the adoption of a new routine for quality control could improve the precision of the dimension measurement obtained by harvesters. Data was collected from three different harvesters. First, a reference data set was collected before the new procedures had been incorporated, and then when the new methodology was implemented another data set was collected by the harvester operators, allowing the two data set to be compered. The results indicated that following the implementation of the new procedures, the reliability and the precision of the measurements has increased. All harvesters included in the study had improved regarding most of the controlled factors such as standard deviation, systematic difference and hit rate within ± 2 cm for length and ± 4 mm for diameter..

The purpose of this masters thesis is to examine the fanzine, a form of amateur publication, in Sweden, both in the traditional paper form and the more recent electronic form. It deals with what is distinctive about the fanzine as a publication and also as a social and cultural product. It also looks upon how the fanzine uses the Internet and the new possibilities it brings. The people behind 18 fanzines, 10 electronic and 8 in paper, have answered a questionnaire about how they produce, publish, distribute and promote their fanzines, what they think about the fanzine as a mode of expression, and how they use the Internet. The masters thesis uses theories within cultural studies as a theoretical approach to the fanzine.

Näringsliv och offentlig sektor står inför ständiga utmaningar att förändra och effektivisera sin verksamhet. Idag ses information som en verklig produktionsfaktor och åtkomst till lämplig informationen ses som en nödvändighet för uppnå effektivitet och produktivitet i de individuella aktiviteterna (Oehlmann, Thoben & Weber, 1997). Med hjälp av elektroniska arbetsinstruktioner på produktionsgolvet har tillverkande industrier hittat en effektiv metod för att minska variationerna, öka kvaliteten, förbättra kommunikationen, minimera kostnaderna och snabbare få ut produkterna på marknaden, den s.k. Time-to-market (Coetzee, 2004).Syftet med denna uppsats är att undersöka om Informationslogistik genom införandet av elektroniska arbetsinstruktioner kan påverka effektiviteten och kvaliteten i ett företag vilket använder sig av elektroniska arbetsinstruktioner.En fallföretagsstudie har genomförts på HMS Industrial Networks AB, en världsledande leverantör av fältbuss-teknologi för automationsutrustning. De har utvecklat ett IT-system för att hantera elektroniska arbetsinstruktioner vilket de använder fullt ut i sin tillverkning.Mer praktiskt har uppsatsens arbete handlat om att undersöka hur de anställda upplever att det påverkat deras effektivitet i det dagliga arbetet, såväl som kvaliteten i arbetet, informationen och på produkterna.Intervjuer med användare från dokumentationsteamet och produktionsmedarbetarna har gjorts och resultatet visar att användandet av PRIS och elektroniska arbetsinstruktioner har gett en rad effekter i verksamheten, både för dem vilka administrerar och hanterar produktionsunderlagen såväl som för de berörda användarna på produktionsgolvet och i övriga delar i organisationen.Resultatet visar att Informationslogistik i allra högsta grad kan påverka effektiviteten och kvaliteten i ett företag.

Gastric and intestinal disorders are common and costly human health problems worldwide. Helicobacter pylori are a gram-negative, pathogen bacteria and the most common cause of duodenal and gastric ulcer in the stomach the intestinal mucosa. Prolonged infection and colonization can lead to chronic gastritis and stomach cancer. H. pylori are present in the gastric and intestinal mucosa of half of the world population and a relation between infection and low socioeconomic status has been shown.

The beauty industry has experienced a turnover increase of 220 % the last 20 years (Jones, 2010). At the moment the market for men's skin care is seeing the fastest growth rate in the cosmetic industry and multinational companies such as Procter and Gamble and L'Oréal have identified a "multibillion-dollar potential" within the segment. BUT - fresh research from the category leading company L'Oréal, shows that only 48 % of the male consumers use a skin care product specially adapted for men. It further shows that as many as 28 % of these do not even know how that skin care product got into their bathroom cabinet. The purpose of this paper is to get a deeper insight into men's relationship with skin care products and grooming.