This research studies the phenomena of hospital groups expanding beyond their home country by setting up operations in less developed countries, and patients travelling out of their country for healthcare services, by looking at the internationalisation of private healthcare firms from Singapore. The research helps to address a gap in the literature as there is a lack of firm-level research on internationalisation of healthcare firms, and even more so for firms from Southeast Asia. For practitioners, the research offers a better understanding of the internationalisation strategies and choices adopted by healthcare firms, and more generally, service firms. With the region which Singapore is part of undergoing rapid integration, the study also offers useful insights on the impact of regional integration on internationalisation of healthcare firms. Using a multiple-case study of four private healthcare firms from Singapore, the research examines the where (market selection), how (entry modes) and when (timing) of their internationalisation, as well as their response to regional integration, in the context of existing literature on internationalisation of firms. The study shows that the internationalisation strategies of healthcare firms from Singapore, in relation to market selection, entry modes and timing of entry, were well-explained by existing theories on internationalisation of firms. Family ownership was identified as a reason for the deviation from theory for one of the cases. Specifically on the internationalisation of healthcare firms, the study shows that healthcare services in Singapore is undergoing commodification, with increasing use of and emphasis on 'marketing' to procure patients-customers; increasing emphasis on quality; and the creation of customers and consumers. This has made healthcare services increasingly 'exportable' in the sense that they can be 'sold' overseas away from the point of 'production', via representative offices, instead of having to rely on higher commitment non-export entry modes as indicated in the literature. Another deviation from literature was the case firms' stated preference to make market entry using management contract instead of joint venture. This can be attributed to their strategic need to internationalise quickly and the high cost of building new healthcare facilities. Using the findings from the analysis, the thesis proposed a characterization of the internationalisation strategies of a healthcare firm from Singapore, in terms of market selection, entry modes and timing of entry. A conceptual model on the internationalisation of healthcare firms was also developed, identifying the factors which may influence the internationalisation of healthcare firms. Besides, the study identified that the healthcare firms went through four phases of internationalisation process, namely, learning, opportunistic, de-internationalisation and maturisation, with each presenting some unique patterns of internationalisation by the firms. Further analysis showed that the four phases tied in well with the 'Link-Leverage-Learn' framework of Mathews (2006) for emerging/second wave multinational enterprises (MNEs), hence offering a new perspective for evaluating the internationalisation of such firms in future. On impact of regional integration, a possible 'ideal' model for a healthcare MNE in an economically integrated region was proposed. Applying the model, it is proposed that internationalisation by healthcare MNEs will increase as the region integrates, and there will be further consolidation within the industry. Healthcare MNEs from small countries like Singapore are likely to compete particularly strongly, as they are under even greater pressure to secure the foreign markets given the constraint of their small domestic population.

De fameux arrêts rendus le 10 juillet 2002, par la Chambre sociale de la Cour de cassation, on retient surtout le revirement de jurisprudence concernant les clauses de non-concurrence insérées dans un contrat de travail : pour être valides, ces stipulations doivent désormais remplir différentes conditions cumulatives, dont le versement, au salarié, d’une contrepartie financière. Mais le visa - inédit - du « principe fondamental de libre exercice d’une activité professionnelle » a moins retenu l’attention. Certains ont vu dans cette norme un simple substitut de principes plus classiques (tels les principes de la liberté du travail, de la liberté du commerce et de l’industrie ou de la liberté d’entreprendre), tandis que d’autres ont cru trouver le véritable fondement de ces arrêts novateurs dans l’article 1131 du Code civil requérant que toute obligation ait une cause. La consécration et la sollicitation de ce principe de libre exercice d’une activité professionnelle constituent pourtant un apport majeur de ces décisions et d’une série significative d’arrêts postérieurs. Par référence à cette norme – et sans précision de son assise textuelle – la Cour de cassation a construit le régime des clauses de non-concurrence en droit du travail et conduit une véritable politique jurisprudentielle en la matière. Cette norme a en outre fondé la mise en question de la validité d’autres clauses et d’autres pratiques. Sa promotion en fait un élément singulier du droit positif, capable d’enrichir divers débats et de régir nombre de situations juridiques, au-delà des rapports de travail salarié. Son avènement et ses conquêtes participent aussi de phénomènes plus amples affectant l’ordre juridique français, notamment sa constitutionnalisation. Son actualité comme ses potentialités commandaient de consacrer enfin une étude à cet authentique « principe », de l’identifier précisément et de prendre la mesure de sa portée. / From the well-known court rulings pronounced by the Social Chamber of the Court of cassation on July 10th 2002, the most notorious is the reversal of jurisprudence about non-competition clauses inserted into an employment contract: to be valid, these stipulations now have to satisfy several cumulative conditions, among others the payment, to the employee, of a financial compensation. But the visa – never seen before – of the “fundamental principle of free exercise of a professional activity” didn’t get as much attention. For some people, this norm was just a substitute of more classical principles (as the principles of freedom of work, of freedom of trade and industry, or of freedom of enterprise), while others found the real foundation of these rulings in article 1131 of the Civil Code, that requires that any obligation has a cause. However, this principle of free exercise of a professional activity recognized in these decisions and used in a series of subsequent court rulings is a major contribution.Through this norm – without detailing its textual foundation – the Court of cassation built the non-competition clauses’ rules in labour law and drove a real case law policy. Furthermore, thanks to this norm, the validity of other clauses and other practices was questioned. The promotion of this norm makes it a singular element of positive law, able to improve many discussions and to govern many legal cases, beyond salaried work relationships. Also, its advent and conquests pertain to largest phenomena which affect the French legal order, for example its constitutionalization. Its topicality as well as its potentialities required to devote a study to this authentic “principle”, in order to identify it accurately and to evaluate its impact.

Magister Educationis - MEd / Regional integration is being proposed as a means to development in Southern Africa. As a part of the formal agreements regarding this cooperation, a Protocol on Education in the Southern African Development Community region has been signed. This research set out to compare the higher education systems of two Southern African countries and to examine the extent to which this Protocol has had an impact on national policies and practices. The research sought to investigate this by means of exploring the extent to which the Protocol has provided an institutional frame which is guiding the development of higher education policy in each of the two countries. The findings of the study indicate that the Protocol, rather than providing leadership in the area of education policy, is to a large extent a symbolic document, reflective of norms already existent in national policy in the two countries studied. The analysis found that the Protocol is not strong on the regulative domain, and that this may reflect the general tensions that exist in the region between regionalism and national sovereignty. Although, in general, educational practices in the two countries were found to be in line with Protocol aims, no areas of national policy were found which could be specifically ascribed to the Protocol. On the other hand, the accounts provided of policy development in each of the national contexts illustrate clearly how policy has grown in these two contexts, and how it is connected to broader national goals and previous education achievements. The national logic thus appears to be a far stronger determinant of policy than regionalism aims. The analysis also found that differences in higher education policy between the two contexts were not as great as had been expected, and over time, the systems appear to be becoming, at policy and structural levels, more similar. There is little in the Protocol itself which appears to be driving this increasing isomorphism, although undoubtedly, the processes which the Protocol has set in motion, such as regular meetings of the Education Ministers of the different countries, is acting to diffuse models of appropriateness with regard to education policy. However, it seems more likely, given trends in the global context towards apparent increasing uniformity in higher education policy, that global isomorphic pressures are being exerted directly onto the two countries, and that similarities between their polices can be explained as a result of this. / South Africa

Cette thèse vise à comprendre l’émergence de l’édition indépendante au Chili depuis le tournant des années 1990. Coïncidant avec le retour vers la démocratie, elle incarne la confrontation entre deux logiques d’internationalisation du marché du livre au niveau mondial : l’une s’inscrivant dans la concentration du marché de l’édition autour de multinationales ; l’autre se nourrissant du capital symbolique accumulé et valorisé au gré d’alliances internationales entre petits éditeurs. Dans cette dernière, il est question de la fabrication de l’indépendance comme stratégie de résistance collective. S’appuyant sur la catégorie de la diversité culturelle et la place du livre « produit pas comme les autres », ces éditeurs ont construit des passerelles entre l’Amérique latine, le Canada et la France - qui leur ont permis d’acquérir une reconnaissance auprès des agences publiques chiliennes dans le champ de la culture, tout en produisant des réaménagements de l’espace éditorial plus vaste. L’étude de ce répertoire d’actions permet de comprendre les ressorts de la reconnaissance politique de ce petit groupe d’éditeurs, qui leur a permis d’assurer leur survie économique au plan national et international face aux logiques néolibérales des multinationales de l’édition et aux contraintes du cadre transitionnel vis-à-vis du livre et de la lecture. / This thesis aims to understand the emergence of independent publishing in Chile since the turn of the 1990s. Coinciding with the return to democracy, this type of publishing is characterized by a confrontation between two different internationalization rationales in the global book market. One rationale is part of the process of concentration of the publishing market around multinationals. The other, is nourished by the symbolic capital accumulated and valued through international alliances between small publishers. In this last rationale, internationalization is about the fabrication of independence as a strategy of collective resistance. Based on the category of cultural diversity and the idea of the book "a product like no other", small publishers have built bridges between Latin America, Canada and France, which have enabled them to gain recognition from Chilean public agencies in the field of culture, while at the same time producing changes in the wider editorial space. The study of this repertoire of actions allow us to understand the political recognition of this small group of publishers, as a mechanism that enabled them to ensure their economic survival at the national and international levels, against the neoliberal logic of multinational publishing companies and the constraints of the transitional framework vis-à-vis books and reading.

Nous étudions les méthodes de management stratégique de l’entreprise familiale qui favorisent l’internationalisation performante et durable. Sur base de quatre cadres théoriques, la création de valeur économique durable, le socle stratégique, le modèle séquentiel d’Uppsala et l’apprentissage organisationnel, nous avons émis l’hypothèse qu’une stratégie d’internationalisation est performante et durable si les méthodes de management stratégique de l’entreprise familiale reposent sur des variables endogènes sociales et économiques. Au travers d’un cas longitudinal de recherche-intervention qualimétrique, nous avons ainsi identifié et mesuré les facteurs endogènes de performance durable de son internationalisation. Deux facteurs dominants de performance et deux de durabilité lui procurent un avantage concurrentiel : des pratiques de pilotage et de contrôle de trois natures incrémentales managériale, organisationnelle et informationnelle, la renégociation fréquente du « pacte organisationnel de vie commune », la mesure de ces facteurs incorporels et endogènes mobilisés et l’organisation de l’apprentissage tiré de l’expérience. / We study family businesses’ strategic management methods that promote sustainable and efficient internationalization. Based on four theoretical frameworks, sustainable economic value creation, strategic base, Uppsala’s sequential model, and organizational learning, we have ventured the following research hypothesis: the internationalization strategy boosts sustainable performance if family businesses’ strategic management methods rely on social and economic endogenous variables. Through a longitudinal intervention-research case, we have identified and measured its internationalization sustainable performance endogenous factors. Two main performance factors and two main sustainability factors provide competitive advantage for it: steering and controlling practices with three incremental functions (management, organization, and information), regular negotiation on “how to live together organizational agreement”, measurement of intangible and endogenous factors, and organization of experience-based learning.

Because of an increased Globalisation, it is no longer a question whether or not to operate on an international level. Globalisation refers to the fact that companies do not only compete with local companies; they also compete with companies that invade the domestic market. The international participation establishes a coercion to deliver a competitive international marketing. Guidelines for Internationalisation and international marketing have been done on the basis of the premise of big companies. Hence, when it comes to small and medium-sized B2B companies this thesis contributes with additional information.   The purpose is to explore how small and medium- sized B2B companies market themselves in an international context. Understanding how these companies have come as far as they have come, how these companies perform on the international market and how they act to reach new markets. This has been explored through literature revolved around major steps in internationalisation and standardisation or adaptation of the marketing mix in the context of SME and B2B.     The study is based on three case studies of three Swedish international small and medium-sized B2B companies. The research approach was abductive, and the empirical collection was of qualitative form. The empirical material was collected through in-depth semi structured interviews with knowledgeable representatives from international small and medium-sized B2B companies. The interviews were complemented with secondary data.   Findings reveal that even though the three companies are in stage three in their internationalisation, there are differences in regard to how active they are internationally. Regarding how the companies internationalises, these companies internationalised because of a demand abroad or the benefit of increase profit. These companies mainly used waterfall approach and entered countries one by one with the exception of one company who used sprinkler approach. Also, these companies entered countries that are similar and close compared to the domestic country Sweden. Furthermore, these companies entered a market through Direct Export in forms of subsidiaries and own or locally agents. Furthermore, insights in standardisation and adaptation of the marketing mix were revealed, where product and place were adapted by all companies. Price and promotion were adapted in two out of three companies and standardised in one company. Connected to the context of the study, being a small and medium-sized company was not a crucial limitation for the companies’ internationalisation. Additionally, regarding the context of B2B, quality & design, Long-term customers & Word of Mouth showed to be the most important key factors for B2B companies that operate internationally.

Addressing environmental issues is becoming increasingly important for businesses and NGOs. In addition, through the internationalisation of these organisations, the problem is becoming global. To address environmental issues in an effective way, there is a need to form a cross-sector collaboration between NGOs and businesses. Thus, to have a successful collaboration, it is important to search for suitable partners. This thesis investigates the partner search process of NGOs for cross-sector collaboration. It investigates how the process of partner search with regard to drivers for collaboration, formation typology, success factors compatibility, resources, and capability, as well as trust affect the partner search of three NGOs with different internationalisation degrees. A literature review has been conducted to investigate what has been discussed regarding the key concepts: environment, internationalisation degree, partner search, formation, drivers, and success factors. The resulted conceptual framework is used to analyse the empirical data. The study was conducted following an abductive approach since existing literature is only existent on firm-perspective so far. To investigate the NGO´s partner search for potential business partners, the thesis follows qualitative research where semi-structured interviews were conducted to create three single cases. The cases represent three internationalisation degrees, namely local NGO, regional NGO, and international NGO. The analysis discusses the differences and similarities between the empirical findings and the theoretical findings. The conclusion suggests that the internationalisation degree influences the partner search process slightly in every key concept. This is mainly due to the interdependence between each concept, which challenges a clear distinction. Nevertheless, the main implication for theory is the contribution to the so-far missing NGO perspective on the partner search in cross-sector collaboration. This thesis also provides practical implications where it appeals for NGOs to clearly understand the intention of the business partner for the collaboration and build trust. The study concludes with limitations and future research implications.

Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / Internationalisation or the “process of integrating an international/intercultural dimension into the teaching, research and service functions of a higher education institution” (Knight 1997: 8) has become an important aspect of the domination of higher education institutions. In South Africa as in countries like the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Japan and Canada, there have been dramatic increases in the numbers of international students. Research shows that the majority of these international students experience various difficulties when the academic culture of the host environment is different from that of the home environment in many respects (Al-Murshidi, 2014; Abukhattala, 2013). The present study employs a social approach to academic literacies (Barton and Hamilton, 2000) to examine the academic reading and writing practices of a group of Libyan students in South Africa (against the backdrop of the home academic culture). Using both quantitative and qualitative methods (Creswell and Plano, 2011), data were collected and analysed to address reading and writing across Libyan and South African academic cultures. The sources of data include Facebook discussions, focus group discussions, questionnaires, documents (such as policies of UWC relevant to my study), and interviews with selected UWC officials. Thematic analysis was used to analyse qualitative data whereas SPSS was used to analyse quantitative data.

Over the past decades, globalisation dynamics have experienced a shift in regard to their driving economic sectors. At the beginning of the 21st century, the global economy will no longer be primarily driven by manufacturing companies but by companies in the service sector. Among them are large retail companies that, with their demand-driven supply chains, organise the global economy to a significant degree. The retail sector represents a particular case within internationalisation dynamics. With its special characteristics and logics it poses special challenges to internationally expanding companies. This is reflected in the facts that the intensive expansion phase of retail trade began relatively late compared to other sectors and that the sector’s level of internationalisation is still comparatively low. This paper focuses on two aspects of retail internationalisation that are underrepre-sented in research. (1) International expansion is by no means the final stage of international economic integration. Coe and Wrigley (2017) speak of a new era of globalised distribution, characterised by, among other things, the concentration of leading retailers on their strong foreign markets and the withdrawal of their operations from other countries. However, our understanding of these dynamics, their drivers, and their effects is inconsistent. This dissertation contributes to closing this gap and brings a new empirical perspective into the research literature by discussing the perspective of the market of inward for-eign direct investment (FDI). This is novel as, until now, research in this area has largely been based on the view of internationalizing companies’ Western home markets. In addition, this dissertation adds a new level of investigation through the exhaustive examination of a market (for the sub-sector of grocery retailing). (2) Beyond the import of financial capital, potential knowledge transfers into the local economy are an important argument for opening up to FDI. The extent to which the knowledge base of an economy is actually improved and upgrading processes of local companies are driven by the entry of a transnational company (TNC), seems to depend strongly on the degree of a TNC’s local embeddedness. This varies according to the sector and the corporate strategy. We know very little about knowledge transfer and up-grading in the context of internationalisation processes in the retail sector, as the discussion on cross-border knowledge transfer through FDI and the discussion on the internationalisation of the retail sector have so far largely been conducted separately. This dissertation contributes to the connection of these research strands. In this respect, it helps to correct the ‘production bias’, the strong orientation of the scientific discourse on knowledge transfer and upgrading towards the manufacturing, technology-intensive industry. The overall goal of the dissertation is to make an empirically derived contribution to research on retail internationalisation and its local effects in emerging markets from the perspective of relational economic geography. The dissertation addresses the dynamics, drivers, decision-making processes, and traces of FDI in the retail sector. In addition, it examines horizontal and vertical knowledge transfers and the upgrading processes of local suppliers of fresh food triggered by FDI. The study is based on the global production network-approach (Henderson et al. 2002), which conceptualises TNCs as networks whose subsidiaries are embedded in a particular context. The global value chain-approach (Gereffi et al. 2005) and the concept of up-grading, which is discussed in its context, are used as a framework for analysis. This approach is helpful to analyse the mobility of actors within a value chain toward a more advantageous position and the role of buyer companies in these developments. The dissertation combines the GVC research with the literature on (local) knowledge transfer. It uses the distinction between explicit and implicit knowledge developed by Polanyi (1958) to analyze the extent to which knowledge is transferred by FDI across national borders. Thus, the dissertation contributes to the link between GVC/GPN research and research on international knowledge transfer/the local acquisition of skills, which has been largely lacking. The dissertation uses the regional example of Turkey. The country stands as an example for the group of emerging countries. Due to dynamic economic development and significant FDI inflows, it represents a suitable and interesting case in the context of this thesis’s research interest. To gain a deeper understanding of the internationalisation dynamics of the retail sector, including their drivers and effects on local economic development, the study follows a qualitative research approach. The analyses are based on data collected in guideline-based, qualitative interviews. A total of 71 semi-structured interviews were conducted in Turkey between summer 2015 and spring 2016. Among the interviewees are 32 managers of transnational and local food retailers, 28 managers of supplier companies of fresh fruit and vegetables, and 10 experts of the retail and agricultural sector in Turkey. The study shows current dynamics and drivers of the retail sector’s internationalisation processes. At the beginning of the new millennium, the investment trend in Turkey reversed and foreign divestments (FD) started to dominate the sector. In the meantime, all transnational food retailers have divested from the market. This development illus-trates the dynamics of the new era of retail distribution to an extent not previously described. The actors in the (former) host market emphasise the defensive character of this FD. They see the operational challenges and the inability or unwillingness of the TNC to adjust to the market as reasons for the failures in the foreign market. This assessment contradicts the statements of the management in the TNC's home markets and partly also the scientific literature, which is mainly based on interviews with these actors. They emphasise the offensive character of FD. By bringing together the perspec-tives of the host- and the home market a holistic picture of the decision-making process behind FD emerges. It shows that the divestment decision is not only the reversal of an expansion decision, but follows its own logic (see Figure 8 on page 72). The dissertation demonstrates that foreign retailers import company-specific re-sources from their corporate networks into the host market and thus influence the development of the local retail sector. Comparing the results of this work on the channels of horizontal knowledge transfer with the results of the literature subject to a produc-tion bias, it becomes clear that demonstration and imitation effects are of particular importance due to the high visibility of retail practices. However, despite the compara-tively low-tech nature of retail, transfer processes go far beyond demonstration and imitation. All transfer channels discussed in the literature on the manufacturing sector are relevant to retail. The transfer of implicit knowledge takes place in particular through joint ventures/acquisitions and the fluctuation of personnel. The study further reveals vertical knowledge transfers from foreign retailers to local suppliers of fresh fruit and vegetables and shows that TNCs proactively shape the de-velopment of their suppliers in the host market. Motivated by an initial lack of adequate suppliers, transnational retailers are proving to be an important driver for the moderni-sation of this supplying industry. The deep (purchasing) network embeddedness of re-tail favours knowledge transfer through backward integration. In order to remain a permanent part of the modernizing supplier network, suppliers must vertically inte-grate functions up and down the value chain, including agricultural production. This is driven forward by retailers through direct involvement and through the targeted selection of suppliers. After TNCs withdraw their capital from the host market, the knowledge of the subsidiaries, in former employees and incorporated in established practices, remains in the host market. The dissertation shows that local companies that take over the TNCs’ subsidiaries use this knowledge in different ways. The successful among them develop hybrid business strategies. They use the TNCs' company-specific knowledge, in particular purchasing practices. But they also bring their local resources into the company which is particularly expressed in a deep sales-side network embeddedness and speed in decision-making processes. The dissertation makes conceptual contributions at various levels. First, it illustrates the broad spectrum from localisation to internationalisation within which the processes summarised under the term globalisation are classified. Localisation processes seem to overlap with internationalisation processes, especially when internationalisation is driven by market seeking motives, which are often central in the service sector. The dis-sertation further expands the research literature by linking the literature on retail internationalisation with the literature on local knowledge transfer in the context of FDI. It thereby contributes to a better understanding of the role of TNCs in the dissemination of knowledge in global networks or chains and the formation of local capabilities. Detached from the transnational and sectoral context, the study establishes causal links between FDI and local effects by providing insights into mechanisms of knowledge transfer that remain hidden in quantitative research. The work moreover contributes to the literature on upgrading in GVCs by refining the upgrading concept for the specific context of the agri-food sector. The results of the dissertation are of applied relevance for both actors from emerging countries receiving FDI and for managers of transnational retail companies. One of the most important findings for actors from FDI-receiving economies is that FDI in the re-tail sector can also be a constructive force. A certain degree of target compatibility can create advantages for all parties involved. Local retailers can acquire knowledge from international retailers operating in the country. The dissertation shows retail managers how they can make use of this possibility. It also shows managers of local suppliers of fresh food how they can take advantage of upgrading opportunities through cooperation with foreign retailers and how they can secure themselves a place in the supply network in the long term. The dissertation further provides orientation for managers of transnational retailers in their entry into foreign markets. It gives insights into how to actively embed in the host country in the context of cross-border expansion and which factors should be taken into account when deciding on a FD.

International entrepreneurship is a prominent phenomenon in contemporary research, because of the ease of internationalisation for companies. Start-up hubs in Europe are booming and especially web-based tech companies internationalise quickly. This new type of company, which internationalises almost immediately after foundation, is called born global. Research showed that despite the interest in born global tech start-ups, there is no representative model visualising the process of their internationalisation. Therefore, secondary research is conducted, as well as empirical research in the form of qualitative interviews with three representative, successfully internationalised tech start-ups from Europe. These companies are the music streaming service Spotify, social marketing SaaS Facelift and business management SaaS Ivy. The internationalisation factors resulting from this research can be divided into a preparation phase, possible strategy development and an implementation phase. Within these phases, factors are separated into company- internal and external influences. Based on these findings, a new model on the internationalisation process of web- based tech start-ups is developed. / Internationell entreprenörskap är ett framstående fenomen inom modern forskning eftersom det blir enklare för företag att expandera över nationsgränserna. Startup-hubbar växer fram överallt i Europa och framförallt webbaserade techbolag är snabba med sin internationaliseringsprocess. Det handlar huvudsakligen om en viss typ av företag som kallas för born global, vilket innebär att bolaget börjar sälja sina produkter eller tjänster internationellt direkt efter grundandet. Forskning kring ämnet visar att det finns ett stort intresse för denna typ av företag men inga representativa modeller som visualiserar processen bakom deras internationalisering. Därför genomfördes sekundär forskning samt empirisk forskning i form av tre kvalitativa intervjuer med representanter från framgångsrika och internationella tech startups från Europa. Undersökningen ledde till upptäckten av olika faktorer som påverkar internationaliseringsprocessen. Dessa faktorer kategoriseras som interna eller externa påverkningar på företaget. Internationaliseringsfaktorerna kan delas in i tre faser - förberedelse, möjlig utveckling av strategi och implementering. Baserat på dessa resultat har en modell om internationaliseringsprocessen för born global tech startups utvecklats.