Sustainable investing is an investment trend that has arisen in the past decade. The private equity industry has proven effective in providing financial returns and is increasingly shifting its focus towards green assets. This enables private equity firms to facilitate investors' demand for financial returns alongside non-pecuniary benefits, such as positive environmental impact. Contrary to other funds, private equity firms use their fund capital to invest as a majority owner in private companies that they see potential in actively improving for a few years. This study intends to demystify private equity's value creation by studying the private equity firm Alder's engagements with three selected sustainable portfolio companies, while also suggesting improvements for Alder's future work. The study's research method takes on a qualitative approach, using thirteen semi-structured interviews, to triangulate Alder's perceived value-added within and between portfolio companies. The analysis takes on an abductive approach and results in four levers of impact used by Alder to create value for its portfolio companies. The suggested levers of impact are: i) Alder funds its portfolio companies’ growth endeavours, ii) Alder strengthens its portfolio companies' sustainable profile, iii) Alder supplies its portfolio companies with significant process and industry experience, and iv) Alder ensures a scalable governance structure at each portfolio company. Given these levers of impact, the following suggestions are proposed to Alder: i) Alder should exclusively target private-to-private deals, ii) Alder should target industries it has experience in, iii) Alder should clarify the sustainability ambassador role, iv) Alder should include additional sustainability-linked goals in its owners’ agendas, and v) Alder should continue to appoint an external chairman of the board in each portfolio company. The new suggested levers of impact stem from the finding that the discussion of private equity's value creation would benefit from departing from the traditional levers of impact, initially promoted by Kaplan & Strömberg (2009). That is, financial, governance and operational engineering, as these are found to be of limited relevance, as private equity's active ownership seems to be inherently concerned with corporate governance.

This thesis investigates the relationship between value creation and complexity within Business Intelligence (BI) systems. The research questions posed are: "What makes a BI system vary in complexity?" and "In what ways can BI systems generate value for users, and how is this value affected by the systems’ complexity?" The study explores these dimensions of complexity and value using a qualitative approach, the study gathers data from multiple sources, including interviews with BI system users and experts, basic surveys, as well as an analysis of existing literature. The collected data suggest that financial analysis regarding what makes a BI system valuable is mostly irrelevant. What makes a BI system valuable is therefore not quantifiable. For individual users, the time savings compared to getting the same results without the system are what create high value. From a broader organizational perspective, the perceived value is based on whether the system makes the business processes more efficient and the decision-making of higher quality. The findings also suggest that the complexity of BI systems can significantly influence their value creation potential.  Furthermore, the study identifies that the perceived value of BI-systems increases alongside complexity to a certain point, after which the value instead could decrease. We argue that understanding and managing complexity is crucial for optimizing the value generated by BI systems. The findings of this research provide valuable insights for organizations seeking to develop or enhance their BI systems, by shedding light on the relationship between complexity and value creation.

The purpose of this study is to explore how firms create an engaging customer experience through live shopping. More specifically, by performing a case study this thesis will provide an example of how firms use live shopping to create interactions, as well as to provide value through firm offerings.  This thesis performs qualitative exploratory research with an abductive research approach by studying the case company, Flowlife. Both primary- and secondary data sources are conducted. The primary data is collected through semi-structured interviews with seven employees at the selected company and further analyzed through thematic analysis. While secondary data is conducted through observations of two recorded live shopping event and KPIs provided from the company.  The empirical findings highlight that live shopping allows the studied firm to get close to their customers. Moreover, it was stated that the firm recognizes live shopping as a powerful tool to share information to customers; both about their products, but also about “added value” beyond what is embedded in their products. Finally, it can be identified that the firm perceive a control over the interactions that live shopping brings.  The presented study identifies that live shopping allows a firm to reach beyond the ordinary online experience by combining elements from brick-and-mortar stores with digital affordances. This way, a firm can increase the probability of building trust and relationships. Moreover, live shopping is agile in its nature and allows a firm to adjust and customize firm offerings while providing it. It can also be stated that live shopping allows a firm to provide greater value-in-use and elevate a firm’s role in the value creation process by expanding its role in the joint sphere.

Background: Rising global uncertainty and volatility have changed how businesses envision themselves and their future. Particularly Social Business Hybrids emphasize the importance of purpose beyond profit. Their aim is to develop a more inclusive and green economy by pursuing and creating both financial and social value. This aim, however, comes with the risk of mission drift, meaning that the organization could prioritize one value at the expense of the other. As this is an emergent strategic dilemma in the field of social entrepreneurship, it is prudent to find ways to manage the risk of mission drift. In this context, considerable attention has to be given to the question of how employees of Social Business Hybrids manage the risk of mission drift, as their viewpoint has mostly been neglected by prior scholarship. Purpose: The purpose of the present study is to provide an understanding of why the management of mission drift is relevant for Social Business Hybrids and to give new insights into perspectives that employees of Social Business Hybrids have towards tactics and strategies that support successful management of mission drift. By researching the critical role that employees play as stakeholders in the context of mission drift management, we aim to enrich current literature by deriving new insights into strategies that can help Social Business Hybrids successfully balance their dual objectives. Method: This study is based on: Qualitative, inductive research; Ontology – Relativism; Epistemology – Social Constructionism; Methodology – Grounded Theory; Data Collection – 12 semi-structured in-depth Interviews; Sampling – Purposive, Snowball; Data Analysis – Grounded Analysis  Conclusion: In our findings, we ascertained distinct sources that anticipate a risk for mission drift. Further, we identified detailed tactics that can significantly support the management of mission drift. Finally, resulting from the findings, a framework was developed, that proposes five distinctive overarching strategies, which are enabled by two underlying mechanisms that employees in Social Business Hybrids apply to manage mission drift.

In recent years, there has been a notable shift in the conventional strategies employed by luxury automotive brands towards a more digitalized customer journey. This shift reflects the changing landscape of consumer behavior and the growing influence of technology in shaping customer experiences. Customers are increasingly seeking convenience, personalization, and seamless interactions throughout their purchase process, and expect businesses to provide them with engaging and immersive experiences, both online and offline. As a result, luxury automotive brands have recognized the need to establish a strong digital presence and leverage various touchpoints to meet these evolving customer expectations. Consequently, the purpose of this thesis has been to examine and understand how luxury automotive brands create luxury hedonic experiences online, as well as identify the key touchpoints through which hedonic value is created in a digital context. To achieve these objectives, a qualitative multiple-case study was conducted involving seven businesses operating in the luxury automotive sector. The research methodology employed a combination of semi-structured interviews and a structured questionnaire, and the empirical findings were thoroughly analyzed in conjunction with existing literature to discern similarities and disparities among the cases studied. The conclusion of this thesis reveals that luxury brands employ a multi-faceted approach, utilizing high-quality digital content, exclusivity, collaborations, innovation, personalization, customer-centricity, and top-quality customer service to create hedonic experiences. Key digital touchpoints include aesthetically pleasing websites, interactive features, social media platforms for community building, and corporate touchpoints that align digital experiences with offline luxury experiences. Moreover, this thesis can serve as a guide for future endeavors in this field, and researchers can utilize its findings as a foundation to further explore the implications for luxury automotive brands.

Based on an interdisciplinary literature review, the authors propose the Communication Business Model (CBM) as a new management approach for corporate communications. To this end, pertinent definitions, frameworks and typologies of business models are analyzed and combined with insights from corporate communications literature. The CBM outlines the generic architecture of business models for communication departments. Such models describe the basic principle of how such a unit operates, what services and products it provides, how it creates value for an organization and what revenues and resources are allocated. Relevance: The question of whether and how communication departments contribute to organizational value creation has rarely been addressed in research. Such evidence is crucial, however, as communications competes internally with other functions (e.g. marketing and human resources) for budgets and staff. This article fills the gap by applying the business model concept, an established approach from management theory and practice, to communication units. Practical implications: The CBM can be used as a management tool to analyze, explain and innovate communication management in organizations. It is a fertile approach for communication practitioners to make the work of their department visible and to position themselves internally and externally.

No description available.

The circular economy has during the last decade gained traction within academia, politics, and business as it is expected to promote sustainable economic growth and tackle resource scarcity. Further, established firms have to be sustainable to create a future return and be competitive. The circular economy can help firms reduce their environmental impact from business activities and enhance the value of resources. Yet, there is a general lack of understanding of the actions leading towards a circular economy and how the adoption of circular economy principles generates value in a business context. The literature argues that through experimentation of circular novelties, established firms can take the first steps in their transition towards a circular business. This thesis aims to contribute with novel empirical data to the literature field of circular economy, strategic niche management, and business model, where the research questions are framed to address the following purpose: explore how established firms experiment with circular economy and how this experimentation influences the firms’ value proposition and creation. To understand its value chain, the firm must realize its context by adopting a meso-level perspective. Grounded on the empirical setting, the empirical findings and the discussion, an analysis allow us to conclude ten propositions of how circular economy experimentation unfold within firms and how circular economy implementation at the micro-level impact the value chain. The propositions can be divided into three areas of contributions. First, the findings contribute with knowledge on how circular experimentation evolves within the established firm. Second, the thesis contributes with an increased understanding of how the circular economy experimentation within the established firms is affected by the surrounding sectoral actors. Third, the study makes analytical contributions of how circular economy experiments within the established firms influence their value proposition, creation, and capture. / Cirkulär ekonomi har under det senaste decenniet fått en stark attraktion inom den akademiska, politiska och industriella världen, eftersom den förväntas främja hållbar ekonomisk tillväxt och tackla den växande resursbristen. Fortsatt måste företag vara hållbara för att skapa framtida avkastning och för att vara konkurrenskraftiga. Dock finns det generellt en brist på förståelse för de åtgärder som leder till en cirkulär ekonomi samt hur implementeringen av cirkulär ekonomi principer genererar värde i ett affärssammanhang. Litteraturen hävdar att genom experimentering av cirkulära innovationer kan etablerade företag ta de första stegen i sin övergång till en cirkulär verksamhet. Avhandlingen syftar till att bidra med nya insikter till litteraturfältet cirkulär ekonomi, strategic niche management och affärsmodeller, där forskningsfrågorna är utformade för att adressera syftet med denna studie: utforska hur etablerade företag experimenterar med cirkulär ekonomi och hur detta påverkar företagens värde erbjudande och skapande. För att förstå dess värdekedja måste företag förstå sitt sammanhang genom att anta ett perspektiv på mesonivå. Den empiriska utformningen, de empiriska resultaten och diskussionen, tillåter oss att konkludera tio propositioner uppdelade i tre områden om hur experiment med cirkulär ekonomi utvecklas inom företag och hur implementering av cirkulär ekonomi på mikronivå påverkar värdekedjan. Således ger denna avhandling tre huvudsakliga bidrag. Först bidrar resultaten med kunskap om hur cirkulära experiment utvecklas inom det etablerade företaget. För det andra bidrar avhandlingen med en ökad förståelse för hur den cirkulär ekonomins experiment inom de etablerade företagen påverkas av de omgivande sektoriella aktörerna. För det tredje ger studien analytiska bidrag till hur experiment med cirkulär ekonomi inom de etablerade förtegen påverkas deras värde erbjudande, skapande och fångande.

In the last decade, marketing automation, a tool for automatic personalization, has been gaining significant traction among marketing professionals. In parallel with the growing adoption trend, many marketing automation platform providers have been extending their offers to include AI features. However, there is a lack of research regarding how AI can enhance the process of marketing automation in a way that creates value, which is the studied topic in this thesis. A qualitative and exploratory case study has been conducted in collaboration with the global B2B company Atlas Copco, a manufacturer of industrial equipment. Digital marketing practitioners were presented with two use cases of AI, segmentation and cross-selling, for personalization and asked about the marketing automation process and the expected impact on value. The findings reveal what would be required in the marketing automation process for the use cases in terms of data needs, learning about customer insights, marketing output and evaluation. In our findings value creation strongly revolve around the value types: ‘excellence’, ‘efficiency’ and ‘privacy’. To conclude, AI will enable more advanced personalization and value creation can be substantial if customer sacrifices are addressed in an appropriate way. Depending on relevance, tone of voice, time and use of channel, different feelings of value are perceived, which are factors that AI can help to determine / Under det senaste årtiondet har verktyg för automatisk marknadsföring blivit populära bland marknadsförare. Automatiska marknadsföringsplattformar fungerar som ett verktyg för att automtiskt leverera personaliserade marknadsföring. Många leverantörer av automatiska marknadsföringsplattformar har utökat sina erbjudanden till att innefatta AI-tjänster. Den befintliga forskningen kring hur sådana AItjänster ska utnyttjas på ett sätt som skapar värde är begränsad och därav behandlas ämnet i den här uppsatsen. En explorativ och kvalitativ fallstudie har genomförts i samarbete med Atlas Copco som är ett globalt b2b-företag. Vid varje intervju presenterades antingen merförsäljning eller kundsegmentering sedan ställdes frågor om den automatiska marknadsföringsprocess och värde. Resultaten indikerar vad som skulle krävas för de undersökta användningsfallen i den automatiska marknadsföringsprocessen samt att värdeskapande är starkt kopplat till värdetyperna excellens, effektivitet, privatliv och datasäkerhet. Slutsatserna indikerar att AI kommer göra den personalisering som uppstår till följd av automatisk marknadsföring mer avancerad. Värdeskapandet från nya AI lösningar kan vara signifikant om implementeringen tar hänsyn och adresserar uppoffringar kunder behöver göra.

This publication-based dissertation, comprising four unique research papers published in peer-reviewed journals, contributes to innovation management theory and explores how organizations can maximize the value of innovations in the new digital normal. It draws insights from 31 cases, 86 semi-structured interviews, and 804 survey participants (excluding pilot studies), employing a diverse range of qualita-tive and quantitative methodologies. The dissertation investigates how organizations can create and cap-ture value from innovations, focusing on contingent and contextual dimensions, capabilities, and leader-ship styles. As a result, it makes four key theoretical contributions. First, it proposes that innovation performance is equifinal but contingent on the configurational approach for each organization (e.g., combinatorial recipe). Alignment between innovation approaches and performance strategies is essen-tial to gain a competitive advantage. Second, it underscores the vital role of middle managers as the crucial link between top management and employees. This middle-up-down management approach combines distinct leadership and communication capabilities to integrate innovations (e.g., innovative work behaviors, digital technologies) into daily working routines, thus facilitating innovation routiniza-tion (e.g., effective innovation implementation). Third, organizations that possess adequate higher-order business model and process efficiency dynamic capabilities evaluate various dimensions (e.g., value, individual, technological, organizational) in their internal and external contextual periphery to deter-mine their action potential. This enables them to assess, reconfigure, and integrate value creation oppor-tunities into their operational capabilities (e.g., business model, processes), leading to improved per-formance when digitally transforming. Fourth, this dissertation conceptualizes the multidimensional (e.g., individual, team, organizational) digital leadership phenomenon, grounding it in the domain of (strategic) leadership theories. Digital leaders constantly oscillate between leading themselves and oth-ers and leading their organizations to create innovative work environments that foster performance. The combined findings of the dissertation call for novel market approaches and adjusted forms of leadership for organizations to thrive in the new digital business landscape. Avenues for further research to enrich the current academic discourse are also presented. If organizations are to enhance their performance (e.g., increase the likelihood of capturing value from their innovations, or deriving a competitive ad-vantage), understanding the underlying mechanisms outlined in this dissertation should help organiza-tions in this endeavor.