There is an increasing pressure on service firms to innovate and compete on new offerings. As our lives become more digitized through the ubiquitous connectivity by the usage of digital devices, companies are now able to collect vast amount of various data in real-time, and thus, know radically more about their customers. Companies could leverage on this growing body of data and developing relevant services based on customer demands accordingly. One industry compelled to benefit by utilizing customer information is the telecom industry due to fierce competition and a need of innovation in a saturated market. Hence, the purpose of this study is to investigate how telecom companies use customer information in their development process of new services by answering the research question: How do telecom companies use customer information within their New Service Development process? To illuminate this, a qualitative research was conducted on three Swedish telecom companies. The findings indicate that telecom companies possess a beneficial position since they are able to collect a vast amount of data about their customers due to the digital nature of their services. However, they struggle to efficiently integrate the data and seamlessly disseminate the obtained knowledge internally. Hence, leveraging customer information in new service development has not reached its full potential and how well it is incorporated is determined by the skills of key employees and their collaboration rather than deployed internal processes.

As most of the project management models were developed for larger projects, there is a lack of understanding of what project managers in short duration projects do. Short-duration projects are projects in multi-project environments lasting for a number of weeks rather than a number of months. Even if they are common today, short-duration projects have not yet attracted the interest of project researchers. The present study aims to analyze what the project managers in short duration projects do and to develop a method for studying the project managers at work. A theoretical framework is built on earlier studies of managers’ work, suggesting three areas having impact on the project manager’s work. The impacting areas are the project, the project manager’s experience, and the organizational context of the project. The project manager and the assisting project manager were studied while managing a sub-project in a greater telecom system project. The project managers were studied one week each using participant observation and interviews. The findings indicate that much of the time at work was spent in meetings of different kinds, to deal with change, and to guard the production teams from being disturbed by changes in the environment. It was also found that studying a multi-project environment from the sub-project’s perspective gives a different view on multi-project environments that have earlier been presented as the project managers in the short-duration project constantly have to adjust to changes, inputs and demands from the surrounding projects and functional organizations. In the end some proposals on directions for further studies of managers of short-duration projects are made.

This thesis is a service design project that has been carried out in cooperation with the telecom company Telia Sweden (belonging to TeliaSonera AB). The purpose of the report was to examine Telia's fixed broadband service for private customers from a customer perspective. Previously, the service has mainly been developed from a technology-driven perspective. During the broadband subscription, the customers are able to borrow a router from Telia but it has been noticed that some customers opt out Telia’s router. The objective of this work has been to deliver useful customer insights and improvement proposals to Telia within the framework of the broadband service. In the project, a service design methodology was used where the focus has been on interactions with customers. The interactions consisted of in-depth qualitative interviews. The project consisted of five phases. An initial preparation phase with a literature study on service design methods, the Internet and broadband technology as well as learning about and understanding the company. During the preparation phase internal hypotheses about the service problem areas were collected. The initial phase was followed by three iterative loops with customer interactions, insight analysis, ideation and conceptualization. Customer insights and concepts have been tested, evaluated, and deepened during the project. In the last phase the result was processed and the insights were rated for easier implementation. A major problem area for many customers was the Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi range, because the technology is perceived as difficult and abstract. The conclusion is that Telia should help their clients to improve the Wi-Fi quality and the project work led to three ultimate concepts tested on customers. Also six recommendations were delivered to Telia. / Detta examensarbete är ett tjänstedesignprojekt som har utförts i samarbete med telekombolaget Telia Sverige (tillhörande TeliaSonera AB). Syftet med rapporten har varit att undersöka Telias fasta bredbandstjänst för privatpersoner ur ett kundperspektiv. Tidigare har tjänsten främst utvecklats utifrån ett teknikdrivet perspektiv. Under tiden som bredbandskund hos Telia får kunden låna en router men Telia har märkt att en del kunder väljer bort routern. Målet för arbetet har varit att leverera användbara kundinsikter och koncept på förbättringsförslag till Telia inom ramen för bredbandstjänsten. I projektet har en tjänstedesignmetodik använts där fokus har legat på interaktioner med kunderna. Interaktionerna har bestått av djupgående kvalitativa intervjuer. Projektet har bestått av fem faser. En inledande förberedande fas med förstudie om bland annat tjänstedesignmetoder, internet och bredbandstekniken, samt tid för att lära känna och förstå företaget. Under den förberedande fasen samlades även interna hypoteser om tjänstens problemområden in. Den inledande fasen följdes av tre iterativa loopar med kundinteraktioner, insiktsanalys, idégenerering och konceptualisering. Kundinsikter och koncept har testats, utvärderats och fördjupats under projektets gång. I den sista fasen bearbetades och rangordnades resultatet för att insikterna lättare ska kunna implementeras på företaget. Ett stort problemområde för många kunder var Wi-Fi och Wi-Fi-täckningen, då tekniken upplevs som svår och abstrakt. Slutsatsen är att Telia borde hjälpa sina kunder att själva förbättra Wi-Fikvalitén och arbetet ledde fram till tre slutgiltiga koncept som testades på kunder och utvärderades. Även sex rekommendationer till Telia levererades.

This thesis studies the use of the functional reactive programming (FRP) framework reactive-banana in a prototype which simulates a part of a Long-Term Evolution (LTE) base station: the Radio Resource Control connection setup procedure. The investigated problem is to determine whether using this FRP framework leads to an implementation with suitable performance and improved maintainability compared to the current implementation. Enhancing the maintainability of the base station software enables quicker and more efficient maintenance activities, which lead to an improved customer satisfaction. Moreover, it means that less programmers need to work on maintenance, so they can work on developing new products instead. In order to compare the use of the FRP paradigm to the one currently used in the base station implementation, the object-oriented programming (OOP) paradigm, a second prototype using this paradigm was also implemented. Having two prototypes implementing the same designed reference model (which is a simplified version of the Radio Resource Control connection setup procedure) enables a relevant comparison of the two paradigms. The two prototypes were then compared in terms of performance and maintainability. The maintainability evaluation consisted in using both software metrics and experts’ assessment, as this has been proven to be the most efficient way to evaluate software maintainability. Four experts were asked to fill in a questionnaire after reviewing the code of the two implementations. The comparison of the two prototypes indicates that the FRP prototype is more maintainable than the OOP one, but the OOP prototype has better performances than the FRP one. Moreover, the performance of the FRP prototype during the conducted tests indicates that such an implementation of the FRP paradigm is not suitable for a real base station.

No description available.

The Internet-of-Things (IoT) brings machine-to-machine communication to a global scale together with new business scenarios and inter-relationships. If compared to previous communication technologies, IoT transforms the traditional value chain and creates a different business ecosystem. In this scenario, incumbent telecom companies are taking the role of technology enablers to enter the market. These companies are trying to find ways to generate new value propositions and to position themselves along the IoT-specific value chain. To do that, incumbents need to overcome a number of external and internal challenges. The purpose of this research is to investigate those challenges from the perspective of an incumbent telecom company via a case study carried out at Ericsson. This Thesis is built on the theoretical foundations of innovation management and business model innovation. The research behind is based on academic literature, opinions from industry experts, market analyses, and qualitative data collected from several interviews and online resources. The outcome from this study remarks some major external and internal challenges faced by incumbents. From the internal perspective, the challenges are related to enable the structures within the company to make possible the development of IoT as a radically new business area. On the external side, the main challenges shift from entering the market and position themselves in the new IoT value chain, to the development of unprecedented relationships, innovative value propositions and a new business paradigm. In order to do that, companies need to understand the unexplored IoT ecosystem, find needs and opportunities via partnerships and develop joint business models. This work provides specific data to complement the scarce literature around the topic of IoT business models and challenges for incumbent companies. It offers practical help to guide managers to understand the nascent IoT market, to define adoption strategies and to find their way through the emerging ecosystems.

This paper discusses the conditional factors indicating market susceptibility toward disruptive innovation. There is a need to separate the different forms of disruptive innovation into segments targeting; technology, product or business model disruption. The concepts are fundamentally different and the literature to date is very one sided toward disruptive technology/product innovation. A shortage of studies on disruptive business model innovation has been discovered. This study therefore presents a framework for evaluating the market susceptibility toward disruptive business model innovation. This paper is a case study looking at two historical cases in the Swedish telecom industry. One case was a highly successful disruptive business model whilst the other has not reached the potential success it could have. The cases are investigated through interviews from persons with strategic positions in the telecom industry during the launch of the business models presented in the cases. This is backed with survey results and statistics from market research conducted by the Swedish post and telecom authority. Conditional factors applied to disruptive technology/product innovations, found in previous studies and theory, are applied to the business model disruption cases. The conditional factors are tested in order to establish to what extent they can be applied on business model disruption. This study also aims to find new conditional factors not covered in previous theory. This study is concluded by presenting 10 conditional factors important for evaluating susceptibility toward disruptive business model innovation. This paper analyses 11 conditional factors from previous theory applied on disruptive technology/product innovation. Out of these, 7 conditional factors can be transferred from disruptive technology/product innovation to disruptive business model innovation theory, whilst 4 conditional factors are dismissed entirely. In addition, 3 conditional factors are added from the empirical findings. The study found that the “change of actors in the value chain” and “high entrance barriers” did not seem to be as important for business model disruption. Market susceptibility in these cases seemed to be more dependent on cost, end customer focus, high margins and scalability. There were however also many conditional factors which have importance both for disruptive business model innovation and disruptive technology/product innovation. These conditional factors concerned the market distribution, the current product, the profitability of the market and the current value chain. Differences between disruptive business model innovation and disruptive technology/product innovation are discovered. The differences are proven crucial when evaluating the market susceptibility toward disruptive innovation. Mainly differences being that business models; are more agile, are not seen as big threats, and seem to be more pull than push oriented. / Den här studien behandlar de faktorer som indikerar en marknads känslighet för disruptiva innovationer. Dessa disruptiva innovationer kan delas upp i tre olika former; produktdisruption, teknologidisruption och affärsmodellsdisruption. Det finns idag en brist på litteratur som behandlar disruption ur ett affärsmodellsperspektiv. Befintlig litteratur för disruptiva innovationer är baserade på fall kring teknologi- och produktdisruptioner. Denna studie presenterar ett ramverk för att utvärdera känsligheten för affärsmodellsdisruption i en viss marknad. I den här artikeln görs en fallstudie kring två historiska händelser då nya affärsmodeller lanserats på den svenska telekommarknaden. En utav dessa var en väldigt framgångsrik affärsmodellsdisruption, medan den andra inte nått samma framgång. Händelserna är undersökta genom intervjuer av personer som hade strategiska positioner inom telekomindustrin under dessa två händelser. Slutsatser som dras är sedan styrkta av enkätresultat och statistik från marknadsundersökningar gjorda av den svenska post- och telestyrelsen. Marknadsfaktorer som är tillämpade på teknologi- och produktdisruptioner från tidigare teori appliceras på dessa affärsmodellshändelser. Faktorerna testas för att se i vilken utsträckning de kan föras över till teori för disruptiv innovation av affärsmodeller. Studien strävar också efter att hitta nya marknadsfaktorer som inte tidigare inkluderats i teorin. Denna artikel avslutas genom att presentera 10 omkringliggande faktorer som är viktiga för att utvärdera känsligheten för disruptiv affärsmodellsinnovation i en marknad. Artikeln utgår från 11 marknadsfaktorer, främst baserade på tidigare teorier om produkt- eller teknologidisruption. 7 av dessa faktorer kan överföras till affärsmodellsdisruption, vilket innebär att 4 faktorer avfärdas i sin helhet. Dessutom visade empirin att ytterligare 3 faktorer var viktiga för affärsmodellsdisruption. Studien fann att ”ändring av aktörer i värdekedjan” samt ”höga inträdesbarriärer” inte verkade vara så viktiga faktorer för affärmodellsdisruption. De marknadsfaktorer som var viktigast för marknadens känslighet för affärsmodellsdisruption var kopplade till kostnads- och slutkundsberoende, höga marginaler och skalbarhet. Det fanns dock flera faktorer som var viktiga för både affärsmodells- och teknologi/produktdisruption. Dessa marknadsfaktorer berörde marknadsfördelningen, den aktuella produkten, lönsamheten, och den aktuella värdekedjan. Skillnader mellan affärsmodellsdisruption och produkt- eller teknologidisruption utreds i denna studie. Skillnaderna visar sig vara viktiga när man undersöker marknadens känslighet för disruptiva innovationer. De stora skillnaderna som upptäcktes var att affärsmodeller är mer agila, är inte sedda som ett lika stort hot, och är mer ”pull”- än ”push”-baserade.

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The telecommunications market is one of the large rapidly growing fields in today’s power supply industry due to the increasing demand for telecom distributed power supply (DPS) systems. The half-bridge LLC (Inductor-Inductor-Capacitor) resonant converter is currently the most attractive topology for the design and implementation of 24V/48V DC telecom power converters. The current doubler rectifier (CDR) converter topology was invented and described in the early 1950s which can offer the unique characteristic of halving the output voltage while doubling the output current compared to a standard rectifier. In this thesis, the current doubler converter topology with its unique characteristic is evaluated as a complementary solution to improve the LLC resonant converter performance, especially for the low output voltage and high output current telecommunication applications. A novel half-bridge LLC resonant current doubler converter (LLC-CDR) is proposed in this thesis which can offer several performance benefits compared to conventional LLC-standard rectifier design . The unique characteristics of the LLC-CDR topology can offer significant improvements by transformation of a 48V converter into a 24V converter with the same power density. This thesis introduces a new SPICE-based simulation model to analyse the operation of this novel LLC-CDR converter circuit design. This model can be used to define the critical component parameters for the LLC -CDR circuit output inductor values. It can also be used to predict the circuit overall performance under different load conditions. Both time-domain based transient simulation analysis and frequency-domain based AC analysis provided by this simulation model showed favourable results in comparison to bench measurement results on a prototype. The model provides a valuable insight to reveal some of the unique characteristics of this LLC -CDR topology. It demonstrates a proof of concept that the conventional LLC resonant converter can be easily redesigned for low voltage, high current applications by using the LLC-CDR topology without requiring a new design for the LLC resonant stage components and the power transformer. A new magnetic integration solution was proposed to significantly improve the overall performance in the LLC-CDR topology that had not been published before. The LLC-CDR converter hardware prototypes with two output inductors coupled and uncoupled configurations were extensively modelled, constructed and bench tested.Test results demonstrated the suitability of an integrated coupled inductors design for the novel LLC-CDR converter application. The integrated coupled inductors design can significantly improve the LLC-CDR converter frequency-domain based AC simulation analysis results. In addition, these results also illustrate the potential benefit of how the magnetic integration design in general could reduce the magnetic component size, cost, and weight compared to the uncoupled inductors design. Finally, a hardware prototype circuit was constructed based on a commercial 1800 W single phase telecom power converter to verify the operation of this novel half bridge LLC-CDR topology. The converter prototype successfully operated at both no load and full load conditions with the nominal output voltage halved from 48VDC to 24VDC, and doubled the output current to match the same output power density. It also demonstrates that the efficiency of this novel half bridge LLC –CDR is 92% compares to 90% of EATON’s commercial 24VDC LLC resonant converter, which can fulfill the research goals.

Background: Companies always look for opportunities to expand their businesses internationally as it is the way for them to grow beyond its current status. Nowadays, emerging markets seem to be very attractive in terms of economic growth. Thus, there is a tendency towards foreign direct investment inflows to emerging market economies. However, these markets can be very risky and there is no guarantee of success. Companies would have to be ready to face challenges and obstacles related to the unfamiliar environment. They would have to deal with the internal confrontation of whether to accept or reject the local rules of the game as well as to face difficulties in terms of maintaining a high standard of business ethics and promoting best corporate governance practices. Overall, the conditions of these markets can negatively affect the ethical behaviour of established foreign companies which in turn can negatively affect the reputation and brand value of these companies.  This paper describes and analyzes the above issues through a case study of two Swedish companies in the market of Kazakhstan: Tele2 and TeliaSonera. Purpose: The aim of this study is to analyze the effects of emerging market economy conditions of Kazakhstan on companies control structure or code of conduct, specifically how they can handle the internal confrontation and maintain a high standard of business ethics and corporate governance practices. Therefore, the tasks were also set to describe and analyze the entry process of two Swedish telecom companies into the market of Kazakhstan in order to improve the understanding of Swedish companies’ preparations, strategy of entry and operations when entering an emerging market of Kazakhstan. Methodology: The research thesis is based on the case study approach which uses a qualitative method to obtain the necessary data. Primary data was collected through interviews with the above mentioned two Swedish telecom companies in Kazakhstan. Secondary data was collected from e-sources. Findings/ Conclusions: In this research, I found that the best entry strategy for entering Kazakhstan is to form a joint-venture with the local partner, but if the company had an earlier experience in similar markets, then the acquisition strategy can be chosen. With regard to the ethical issues, factors such as a weak legal framework, a high level of corruption, poor corporate governance and cultural differences between Sweden and Kazakhstan as well as individual factors of all stakeholders including the manager may have a negative effect on the ethical behaviour of Swedish companies entering and operating in Kazakhstan. It is revealed in this study that Swedish companies manage to confront ethical dilemmas by choosing to “go at it alone”. To be able to confront these issues, companies should set their own bar for how to act as ethically and responsibly. Also, they should ensure the enforcement of codes of conduct, corporate governance, ethics training, ethical role model of top management and whistle-blowers policy.