The increased specialisation and complexity in products and services has created the need for Swedish companies to focus more on their core businesses. This has resulted in them opting to buy services and products that lie outside of their core business from consultancy businesses or other types of suppliers. When companies describe their offers in internal and external marketing it is done often in terms of company or service attributes that are not based on customer value or offered value for the customer. The reason for this is that companies have not adapted their services to the different needs of their customers. As a result of this, they run the risk of offering the same services as their competitors and communicate values that the customers either do not understand or experience as value adding.

Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to investigate whether abnormal stock returns could be identified as a result of a layoff announcement during weak economy.Method: An event study methodology.Theory: Efficient market hypothesis, signal theory.Empirical results: Quantitative data from observations of stock prices in thirty two companies listed on the Nasdaq OMX Stockholm, in the period 2008 -2012.Conclusion: The results indicate that the market reaction was negative because there were negative abnormal returns on the Stockholm Stock Exchange during the period 2008-2012 in connection with the layoff announcements. The market reaction was milder when staff reductions were carried out as a result of a restructuring and stronger when staff reductions were carried out as part of a cost reduction program.The layoff announcements elicited different market reactions depending on the company's industry affiliation. The most negative reaction was in the Healthcare industry. Negative abnormal returns were lower in industries Industrials, Consumer Services and Consumer Goods. There were no abnormal returns for shares of companies in the industry Financials.

Denna rapport beskriver arbetet med att designa och utveckla en plattform för simulering ochutvärdering av olika tradingsystem.Det viktigaste kravet som sattes upp i examenarbetets förstudie var att åstakomma en flexibel ochutbyggbar grunddesign för att man vid senare tillfälle ska kunna uttöka systemet vartefter behov avmer funktionalitet uppstår i en snabbt föränderlig finansiell värld. Vidare skulle Microsofts allrasenaste teknik användas.Resultatet blev systemet Trader som är en modulbaserad applikation med tydliga riktlinjer för hurmoduler ska laddas, skapas, initieras samt hur de kommunicerar med varandra utan överflödigaberoenden. Vägen dit gick via inlärning av diverse designmönster och designprinciper. Omfattandeanvändning av händelser och kommandon för kommunikation mellan olika moduler samtprogrammerandet mot interface istället för konkreta objekt i alla lägen gav få beroenden och enflexibel och utbyggbar grunddesign.Trader kan koppla upp sig mot börsen för att hämta kursdata. Denna data kan sedan användas för attutvärdera hur olika tradingsystem skulle ha presterat i olika tidsintervall.

This paper concerns the question of how one can frame a political message. I investigate how a political frame is bound both to the line of argumentation connected with a certain discourse and to the audience closely related to that discourse.I have chosen to study a single case where the policy process was characterized by a framing contest. The case shows how negotiating the new Services Directive is affected by framing efforts made by the parties negotiating.My conclusions are that the question of a Services Directive lent itself to a definition in terms of "either/or"-arguments. Thus the Directive could be considered either a threat or a possibility. It was the very nature of the matter - the development of the internal market on services - that made possible a debate along the lines of a "left/right"-struggle and where a frame that drew from the European Social Model offered the better explanation thereby succeding in defining the new Directive as a threat.

The Swedish field of digital X-ray imaging has since several years relied heavily on distributed information systems and digital storage containers. To ensure accurate and safe radiological reporting, Swedish software-firm eCare AB delivers a system called Feedback?the first and only quality assurance IT support product of its kind. This thesis covers several aspects of the design and implementation of future versions of this software platform. The focus lies on distributed directory services and models for secure and robust data propagation in TCP/IP networks.

The aim of this study was to reach a deeper understanding of the process that occurs within the social services after receiving a notification according to Chapter 14, section 1, The Social Services Act. More specifically the focus of this study was to illustrate how social secretaries reason about children?s participation in the process, as well as to examine whether the legislative change, Chapter 11, section 1 a, The Social Services Act, has affected the process in any way. The study?s results reflect interviews with five social secretaries who are active in four different municipalities in southern Sweden.

This bachelor?s thesis examines costs of welfare services in municipalities of the region of Västra Götaland in Sweden. Previous research provided reasons to expect a link between costs of welfare services and demographic changes. Furthermore, Willam J. Baumol?s theory about ?the cost disease? also provided reasons to expect a link between welfare services and salary levels.

CGI är ett av världen största IT-tjänsteföretag med säte i Kanada. I Sverige erbjuder CGI flera tjänster där Business Process Services (BPS) är en av dem. Inom BPS finns grupperingen Data Documenting Services (DDS). DDS:s uppgift är att förmedla meddelanden till och mellan såväl människor som företag, via olika kanaler. Meddelanden som förmedlas i form av fysiska utskrifter, exempelvis administrativ post, hanteras inom tjänsten Printing Services.

Under examensarbetet utfördes en undersökning och testning mot en nyutvecklad backend server för ett ärendehanteringssystem hos företaget Navigate Consulting. Syftet med testen är att utvärdera funktionaliteten som är nödvändigt för att skapa systemet, hitta eventuella flaskhalsar som kan uppstå vid utvecklingen samt utvärdera hur kommunikationen mot back-end servern fungerade i praktik.Kravet av testningen mot ärendehanteringssystemet var att det skulle vara i form av en prototyp som grafiskt kunde demonstrera hur funktionaliteten kunde implementeras samt att det var ett webbaserat gränssnitt som kunde köras på en Tomcat 7.0 server. Det beslutades att det grafiska gränssnittet och kommunikationen mot back-end servern skulle ske med Java EE.Kommunikationen mot back-end gjordes via JSON-RPC som är ett lättviktigt RPC som kommunicerar via http. Utvecklat speciellt för JavaScript kunde det dock anpassas för att användas med Java på servern.Examensarbetet genomfördes med nära kontakt med utvecklaren av back-end systemet. Regelbundna möten möjliggjorde att all funktionalitet som behövdes från prototypen fanns samt eventuella uppgraderingar på back-end servern kunde utföras..

The aim of this essay was to examine what kind of help and support social services departement can offer gamblers and their relatives. We also want to examine what the relatives to the gamblers think about the help and support they have got from the social services departement. Central questions we asked were: What kind of help and support can social services department offer the gamblers and there relatives? What kind of help is there to get for children respectively adult relatives? Do the relatives consider that the social worker have enough knowledge about the problem? Do the social workers consider that they have enough knowledge about the problem? This is a qualitative study of three women relatives to the gamblers, three social workers and one specialist in this problem. We have delimited the study to one big city in Sweden.

The aim of this master?s thesis is to investigate a possible connection between the development of mobile library services in Sweden and the development of cultural policy during 1945-2006. Our main question is: is there a connection between the development of the mobile library services in Sweden, as described in Biblioteksbladet, and the development of cultural policy as portrayed by Anders Frenander and Dorte Skot-Hansen? In order to answer this question, we formulated two secondary questions: - How are the mobile library services described in Biblioteksbladet between 1945 and 2006? - Are there any similarities or dissimilarities between the development of the mobile library services and the development cultural policy as described in our theoretical models? If so, in what way? Our study covers the entire time period since the start of the mobile library services in Sweden in the late 1940s. The final year for our investigation is 2006.

AbstractTitle: Interactive marketing and Internet - A study of Radi Medical Systems? educational site (Interaktiv marknadsföring och Internet - En studie utifrån Radi Medical Systems webbplats för kundutbildning)Number of pages: 43 (including enclosures 47)Author: Daniel PalmgrenTutor: Mats LindCourse: Media and Communication Studies CPeriod: Spring 2008University: Division of Media and Communication, Department of Information Science, Uppsala UniversityPurpose/Aim: The aim of this thesis is to examine if Radi Medical Systems? educational site has the potential to create value for the company?s customers, and by that promote improved customer relations. Questions asked are: What kinds of visions does the company have for the site? Which services are offered to the customers through the site? How do the customers experience these sInervices?Material/Method: Information from interviews with representatives from Radi Medical Systems and their customers, observations of the webpage and information from an internal Radi document concerning the educational site has been collected and analyzed through the use of a theoretical framework, in order to provide an understanding for the questions asked. The visions were discussed and analyzed by general concepts of interactive marketing and Internet.

The thesis deals with consumers behaviour in the use of online services and the cultures effect on it. It is a study of Swedes and Danes use of online job data bases. The thesis is based on a quantitative study. A questionnaire were used sent out to 80 Swedes and 80 Danes. The theory concerns areas of online consumer behaviour, decision making and services theory as well as theories within culture in relation to services and behaviour.

This thesis researches the value creation process in Internet based subscription services in accordance with service dominant logic. The aim of the paper is to identify the characteristics of these services and to envisage the future of Internet based subscription services. The authors have utilized a qualitative method in their research which consists of personal interviews as well as a focus group. The main theoretical subjects that are discussed are value creation, customer participation and service dominant logic. The paper analyses the empirical findings by matching them with the theoretical framework.

When studying the voting behaviour of the Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) concerning the Services Directive within the EU, what patterns can be observed? With a starting point in previous findings about voting behaviour, this study analyses the results of the given Roll-call votes in the European Parliament in regards to the Services Directive. Here I focus on the division of votes within and between the member states and the parliamentary political groups; with the aim to identify patterns that might show clash of opinion concerning this issue. I found that ideology seems to play a role in the MEPs voting behaviour. Parties on the far left reach the highest level of cohesion and together with the party on the far right, they voted against the Directive, but due to different reasons.