As of 1 July 2008 the revised Swedish Code of Corporate Governance applies to all Swedish companies whose shares are traded on a regulated market in Sweden. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate whether the introduction of the revised Code has affected the disclosure practice among Swedish companies. We investigate a sample of 43 small and mid cap companies listed on the OMXS Exchange that has previously not been covered by the regulation. We develop a disclosure index, measuring the disclosure level in annual reports before and after the introduction of the Code. The results from the study show that disclosure level has not increased after the introduction of the Code.

Background: Small businesses are key participants in the growth at the Swedish market, partly for the labour opportunities, the technology and economic development. These companies should get resources to grow, both political and economic resources. The medtech companies in an introduction and expansion phase meet with problems concerning the financing of their growth. Key participants whom offer financing are Venture Capitalists.Purpose: The purpose of this study is to examine Venture Capitalists demands on medtech companies in an introduction and expansion phase. A comparison between the demands and how well medtech companies achieve them will be done.

Background and Problem: The lack of auditor independence is discussed being oneof the reasons to scandals such as Enron and HQ. A pricing strategy that has beendebated impairing auditor independence is low balling. To win a new client in atender process, audit firms supposedly offer an audit fee below cost and then increasethe fee the following years to recover the initial loss. The auditors? future financialinterest in the company due to the initial loss is by some believed to impair auditorindependence, which makes low balling in Sweden a relevant phenomenon to study.Aim of study: This thesis aims to explain if low balling exists on the Swedish auditmarket and if the size of companies affects the results of low balling.Methodology: To achieve the purpose of this thesis, a statistical study wasconducted.

This bachelor of economics paper discuss that the increasing globalization has put the Small companies in the Swedish textile and clothing industry in a situation where internationalization has become a necessity. Furthermore has the European Union lead to that this type of companies has to seek growth on foreign markets with great socio cultural distance from the home country, Sweden. Nowadays there?s no time to internationalize in the same course of action like before. Before, the Swedish companies begun their operations abroad in fairly nearby countries and only gradually penetrated more far-flung markets.

I och med den ökade konkurrensen och de minskade avstånden i omvärlden blir fler och fler företag internationella. Den traditionella forskningen fokuserar främst på stora och tillverkande företag. Internationaliseringen kan emellertid anses skilja sig åt från den traditionella uppfattningen på grunde av olika resursbegränsningar. Vidare kan det även antas att hög- teknologiska företag avviker från den traditionella bilden av företags internationella verksamhet, främst beroende på produkternas servicekaraktär och på graden av kompetens som finns i dessa företag. Därför uppstår intresset att i den här uppsatsen undersöka hur högteknologiska småföretag inter- nationaliserar sin verksamhet.

This thesis aims to find a more cost effective model for purchasing and logistics at asmall company. The studied company is a BMX (bicycle motocross) and MTB(mountain bike) retailer. The questions to be answered are: How large parties shouldbe ordered and what mode of transportation is to be used? A literature orientation ofthe field was followed by visits to the company, obtaining information from twodifferent logistics companies and interviews of four other companies in the sameindustry. The study shows that it´s difficult to develop an optimum order quantity fora small company since there often are other factors affecting how large amountshould be ordered.

Problem: Small companies dominate the skin care industry, and they also face moredifficulties, constraints and resistance in strategy implementation and sustainabilitywork than other operators. Still, the trend of sustainability strategies increasesignificantly precisely in this industry.Purpose: The purpose of the study is to contribute knowledge to the field ofsustainability strategies and motives for the implementation of them in smallercompanies who engage with skin care, in Sweden.Framing of a question: Why do some smaller Swedish companies in the skin careindustry choose to implement sustainability strategies in their business?Literature: The literature functions as a framework for the study and is considered toidentify the possible reasons why Small companies choose to implement sustainabilitystrategies or not. The literature is collected before the empirical data.Method: This paper is constructed by a qualitative method approach. The empiricaldata were collected through interviews, by telephone, personal meetings and email,which were then transcribed and the interpreted by a model, which the authors havecreated.Conclusion: Smaller companies are often met by larger resistance and an until up tothe present slowly emerging industry with vague rules and controls as well as ancomparative knowledge of what is good and what is not.

This thesis intended to examine how small enterprises within the retail industry work with brand building of their corporate name. More specifically it intended to examine how they do to choose corporate name and corporate logotype, and how they work to create a desired corporate image. A case-study was performed with three case-companies from different industries. The method was deductive as the empirics were brought in with starting-point in the theoretical frame of reference. The study showed that there are differences in the way small enterprises within the retail industry work with the brand-building of their corporate name.

Background: The Swedish fashion industry grows steadily, today it?s populated by many small and medium sized companies. Due to the big clothing chains dominant position small businesses risks to be ousted out of the fashion industry.Smaller companies may find it difficult to reach out to the customer by traditional advertising because their budgets are often smaller. It is therefore important for smaller companies to create loyal customers. If the smaller sized businesses in the fashion industry do not follow the rapid developments in society and focus on building strong brands and relationships, they will have problems with surviving in the long run.Problem definition: Which communicative factors are important in the choice of brand strategy to create a long-term survival for small and medium-sized companies in the fashion industry?Purpose: The purpose of the essay is to analyse and evaluate the brand as a communications tool for building a brand image.Method: The data which is being used in the essay is collected from interviews with companies and survey of each company's existing and potential customers.Theoretical perspective: Relationship Marketing Perspective and Transaction Marketing PerspectiveTheories: Brand Strategies, Total Communication, Brand Equity, Involvement Theory, Service Value Profit Chain.Empiric: The empirical data is primary data gathered from interviews with a representative for each company and from the questionnaires distributed to the customers of each company.Analysis: The analysis is an interpretation of the empirical material collected from interviews with each company and customers survey.

Abstract Over the years the consciousness of risk has grown. It?s hard to influence risks, therefore there are guidelines stating that significant risk must be included in the annual report. This paper is a case study; the purpose was to examine how four Swedish listed companies chose to disclose their internal and external risks. Risk is initially described in general sense and then it figures to what constitutes an economic risk.Through a case study of four Swedish listed companies? annual reports we have, through qualitative methods found how the companies chose to disclosure their risks.

The cost of capital for traded companies is basically assessed on information from thefinancial market. Small and non-traded companies are lack of this necessary financialmarket information in order to determine an appropriate equity risk premium and tocompute the cost of capital.In the absence of financial information necessary for an external investor, it is difficult toevaluate a non-traded company with the Capital Asset Pricing model (CAPM), which isbased on the financial market information. It measures only the systematic risk, which isthe contribution of one share to the market risk of a portfolio. It is therefore important tofind models that reflect the small and non-traded companies? real business value and theirunique characteristics.

The market of today consist of products/services who resemble each other, the differences are small. Their for it?s necessary for the companies to provide added values to the product so it will stand out from the rest of the products and lead to purchase. A well used strategy in the fashion industry is marketing with celebrities, this is considered successful because it brings attention and strengthening to the brand. Because of this, the strategy also branch out to other industries, but the question is if it?s as successful there? There?s also a serious down-side with the strategy and that is that there?s a great risk with using celebrities.

The ambition of this project is to make an overview of the Swedish upholstery industry and to make a suitable complement to the Carl Malmsten upholstery collection.The Swedish furniture industry employs about 20 000 people in 815 companies. Totally the branch had a turnover of 17,5 billion Swedish krona in the year 2000. Of these 815 companies most of them are small family driven companies with low-tech industry. 10 % of the 815 companies stand for 60% of the production. These are large-scale companies and have a hi-tech industry, even compared with other types of industries.

Many sources point to the same conclusion; throughout the history the research sphere, mass media, governmental industry policies and public life in common have not paid the same attention to medium-sized companies as to small, new or large companies in Sweden. Yet, there are some researchers claiming the need for the medium-sized companies to grow, becoming tomorrow?s Swedish new large companies. Hence, the need for understanding the specific growth conditions of the medium-sized companies are definitely clear. This study aims firstly to identify whether there are specific requirements and obstacles for growth in connection to being a medium-sized company.

Marketing is a broad subject with many different areas. Part of the marketing that has been of great importance is the 4P:s also known as the marketing mix. Marketing mix is included in one of the traditional marketing approaches. In recent years there have been some changes and have begun looking at new ways of looking at marketing. One of the ways is entrepreneurial marketing to the effect that the company tries to use its resources optimally.