The globalization today has led to increased global competition. As companies seek out foreign markets in order to internationalize their operations, it is common that they encounter many cultural problems. Bribery and corruption is a common problem in international trade. Corruption is strongly linked to the national culture which means that corruption is accepted in differing degrees within different nations. This can be a problem when companies establish their operations in foreign markets.The purpose of this essay is to examine and analyze how companies act in a corrupt market without participating in corrupt activities.The authors have performed both a qualitative and a quantitative study.

A new shipyard on the island of Beckholmen consisting of a new ship hall and complementary workshops. The program is extended with rentable industrial space for other smaller companies to take advantage of synergies with the yard and to create an active maritime cluster around Beckholmen. By building a marina and a port at the northern shoreline of the island the shipyard can expand their potential customers to non-commercial and larger recreational boats that are becoming increasingly common in Skärgården. The port is also supplemented with a combined naval fuel station, harbor office and a small café. The boat traffic in the region gets a additional stop at the end of the port and act as an additional gateway to Djurgården. Several small retail spaces with direct access to the water is created along the promenade between the port and Djurgården. The shipyard gets a modern and efficient industry building, while the island is made available to the public again, and Beckholmen will hopefully take an equal place in the city's consciousness as it does visually in the inlet to Stockholm..

The purpose of this study is to examine how textile companies are using "green arguments" in their marketing strategy and how these arguments affect the competitiveness on the market for each of the six companies.The survey that was conducted is based on qualitative interviews with managers responsible for environmental issues in the field of marketing. The purpose of the survey was to examine how companies are using ?green arguments" in order to create competitive advantages. We have chosen to limit the study to the textile industry with the study being carried out in six different companies. The two main theories that make up most of the theoretical framework are Porters five forces and the marketing mix.The survey showed that companies today are using green arguments in their marketing strategy to gain competitive advantages, but only to a certain extent.

Prior research on the ability of financial ratios to predict bankruptcies has shown a significant difference between the companies that went into bankruptcy and those that survived. This paper investigates whether there is a difference in the prediction ability of financial ratios during the last financial crisis compared to relatively normal macroeconomic environments in which most previous studies have been conducted. We use univariate analysis to compare companies that went into bankruptcy during 2010 and 2011 with companies that remained active. Our dataset consists of 51 failed companies that are matched with 102 companies that remained active. All companies were Swedish limited companies with more than 50 employees and the comparison is made with 26 financial ratios.

Many companies are currently working to optimize and streamline their processes and production lines to achieve higher profitability. In increasingly competitive markets, companies are working to find solutions to increase the value of their production with such a small use of resources as possible. A tool used to accomplish this is the Lean management system. Lean comes from the production system that Toyota has been developing since the early 1900's, The Toyota Production System (TPS). The Lean philosophy helps companies, by working towards continuous improvement in its operations, to achieve higher customer satisfaction, more efficient production and ultimately higher profitability. Many companies are working to implement Lean in their organization. But there are many who fail to implement a complete change towards Lean.

Abstract The development towards an international accounting standard implies that Swedish groups of companies that are not quoted on the stock exchange can use a parent company perspective or an entity perspective while making their group accounting. The purpose of this study is to describe and explain the motives behind the groups of companies choice of perspective and to show how these motives agrees with the effect it has on the profit and loss account and on the balance sheet.The study includes four fictitious groups of companies based on real groups of companies. Every group of companies includes 1-3 subsidiary companies, where at least one is owned by the parent company with 51-70 %. Some assumptions were made before the consolidation.Relevant key numbers have been calculated according to both perspectives and then compared. A total of three semi structured interviews have been carried out two with representatives for the real groups of companies and one with a chartered accountant.

For a long time, economic activity has decreased and shows a downward trend in the food sector. To break this requires efforts to strengthen corporate position with the ability to meet market challenges. In the small producers is a great potential for them to be able to increase its profitability thanks to its ability to offer added value in the product. But to achieve this requires not only a willingness and creativity out of the ordinary but also factors that lead us into this report, current issues. The issues are related to marketing, brand building and the importance of developing a stable network. The study aims to investigate how small businesses operate in rural areas are experiencing the possibilities of support from various networks and organizations and that, from a business perspective, and also see which areas that they need more support in to achieve a growing business. The work has been followed by an inductive method, when we initially could not say anything about the empirical results.

The workplace has a direct impact on the physical, psychological, economic and social well-being of the workers. A healthy workplace leads to increased health among the employees which also makes the employees more productive (Källestål, 2004). A poor working environment can have negative consequences for individuals, companies and society (SOU, 2009:47).This is a qualitative study that investigates companies? view of health promotion and how they practice health promotion in working life. Five private and five public companies, with representatives from the management were interviewed.

This thesis work is about how technical consulting companies can accept their organization before a coming recession. Technical consulting companies are together with the rest of the actors in the construction business constantly depended on the current economic situation on the market. How to adapt the organisation depends on the current situation on the market.To adapt the organization in the best way possible the companies need to recruit and educate personal. It is then very important to find a solution on how the current change of generation in the companies will be handled. The large and very much competent group of 40-talists will in a few years retire.

This study was made to compare construction companies for gardens way to work with up following, with purpose to see if there was an efficient and not resource demanded system which gave much value. To achieve the purpose a case study was made. The delimitation for the case study was only to compare the work with up following on individual project. The delimitation on the companies in the study was from ten to sixty employees. That because to reach companies were it´s not the same person how calculates on tenders and than perform the projects. The study was delimitated to the west side of Skåne. T o be able to compare the companies and to find trends, an interviewguide was made and was used during the interviews with the companies.

Millions of animals are annually affected by human activities; in the food industry, zoos and animal shows, clothes and shoes production, furniture and pharmaceutical industry, research, as well as pet and sports animal industry. Companies working with Corporate Social Responsibility, CSR, have become more common and within this area there are great possibilities for companies to work with animal welfare. In this study five companies were interviewed and 27 companies participated in a survey regarding CSR and animal welfare. The aim of this study was to investigate opinion and approach among companies towards implementing animal welfare as a part of their work with CSR. Furthermore the aim of the study was to investigate how companies may implement animal welfare. The result showed that the vast majority of the companies participating in the study works with CSR and the main part of the companies also answered that they have implemented animal welfare. The way of working with animal welfare varied among the participants; e.g.

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.

The demand from Swedish companies of new potential markets to enter is increasing. One of these companies is Väderstad-verken which has the vision to grow approximately 15 percentages every year. To make this possible they must find new emerging markets to enter to be able to grow. Together with Väderstad-verken we have chosen India as a case study. Mainly because of its big agricultural sector that hasn?t yet been developed to modern standard.

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.

Konkurrensen inom klädbranschen är hård och det finns många stora aktörer på marknaden. Småföretag har begränsade resurser till skillnad från de stora aktörerna, det blir därmed viktigt för dem att använda sig av kostnadseffektiva metoder för att kunna nå ut till kunderna. Marknadsföring är en avgörande del när det gäller överlevnad och expandering. Många aspekter spelar in när det handlar om företagens framtid, allt från hur man positionerar sig till hur effektivt man använder sig av marknadsföringsmixen. Det gäller att synas och att få kundens uppmärksamhet samt få kunderna till återköp.