The diploma thesis deals with the implementation of a CRM system in a selected company dealing with the sale of medical supplies in the Vysočina region. The theoretical part of the work contains a basic definition of concepts falling into the field of modern technologies of the 21st century. The aim of the theoretical part is to create a means for the reader to search for selected analyzes, which will be used in the next part of the work. These are the Canvas business model, SWOT analysis, risk analysis and other use of tools. The analytical part creates an overview of the use of methods and analyzes in a particular company and shows the direct application in practice. The final part of the work is devoted to the process of implementing a CRM system into business practice with subsequent use in specific internal processes within business activities. This design part describes the internal processes before implementation and then outlines the methodological work after the already implied system into the process.

We are living in the “Anthropocene” the era in which human activities are responsible for severe damage to the resilience of the ecological and social systems, undermining the Earth’s autopoetic mechanism, integrity and ability to function as a healthy complex adaptive systems. The prevailing societal paradigm for business practices has yet to realise the reality of our current global unsustainable state – and the shift necessary to move us forward collectively. Startup companies have a unique opportunity to gain and leverage competitiveness and attractiveness for funding and customers through sustainability driven business strategies, models and value propositions. This research analyses literature, document and interview data to explore if and how current practices in the Lean Startup contribute to a sustainable society – and how a Strategic Sustainable Development approach might be introduced to enhance the resilience of Lean Startups. Therefore, our key recommendations for Lean Startups that want to introduce an SSD approach are: to raise awareness about the sustainability challenges and opportunities; utilise backcasting towards a vision framed by the Sustainability Principles; focus on fulfilling fundamental basic Human Needs; utilize strategic prioritization questions when pivoting and combine the FSSD ABCD process with the Lean BML cycle. Ultimately, this thesis proposes the use of Strategic Sustainable Trigger Questions to (re)design sustainable business models and value-propositions. We conclude that “asking the right questions - rather than giving answers up front” might spark conversations and innovations in Lean Startups, beneficial for the sustainability of both the individual startup the larger socio-ecological systems.

Background                   The single most important thing for a start-up is to define how they will satisfy their customers’ needs, as it is the key to survival. This can be done by creating a value proposition that presents the benefits of the product and/or service being sold.  Customer involvement have been proven to contribute to both higher customer satisfaction and productivity. It can also make value propositions more accurate and make a start-up gain new customers. A successful value proposition often leads to a higher perceived value for customers, making them willing to pay a higher price.  Despite the benefits, start-ups rarely involve their customers in the creation of value propositions, and there is little research on how this affects the value propositions. Therefore, these research questions were formulated:      Research questions         RQ1: How does customer involvement influence customer value propositions?  RQ2: How can customer involvement be facilitated for start-ups in the creation of value propositions?      Method                           The study consisted of a literature review and a case study. In the literature review, success factors were investigated for value propositions and customer involvement along with answers to how customer involvement could be facilitated for start-ups. The case study was performed at a start-up company in the EdTech sector where a value proposition created solely by the case company (without customer involvement) was compared to a new value proposition with customer involvement, created in this study. Both were placed in the framework of the value proposition canvas. The value proposition with customer involvement was based on ten interviews with both customers and potential customers in the customer segment.       Findings                         The findings show that the value proposition with customer involvement was broader, more extensive and included more important customer needs. There is also a low risk of missing latent needs.  To facilitate customer involvement for start-ups, the findings suggest that the customer involvement must cost little time and money. Social media can be used as a platform for gaining generic information about customers while a few deep relationships with customers can generate deeper understandings about customer needs. Findings also suggest that a third party can generate objective information about key customers with low time and money costs. / Bakgrund                       Det viktigaste för ett nystartat företag är att definiera hur de ska tillgodose sina kunders behov eftersom det är nyckeln till överlevnad. Detta kan göras genom att skapa ett värdeerbjudande som presenterar fördelarna med den produkt och/eller tjänst som säljs.  Kundinvolvering har visat sig bidra till både högre kundnöjdhet och högre produktivitet. Det kan även göra värdeerbjudanden mer exakta samt genererar nya kunder till nystartade företag. Ett framgångsrikt värdeerbjudande leder ofta i sin tur till ett högre upplevt värde för kunderna vilket gör dem villiga att betala ett högre pris.   Trots fördelarna involverar sällan nystartade företag sina kunder vid skapandet av värdeerbjudanden, och det finns bristfällig forskning på hur detta påverkar värdeerbjudandena. Därför formulerades dessa forskningsfrågor:       Forskningsfrågor           FF1: Hur påverkar kundinvolvering värdeerbjudanden? FF2: Hur kan kundinvolvering underlättas för nystartade företag vid skapandet av värdeerbjudanden?      Metod                             I studien utfördes en litteraturstudie och en fallstudie. I litteraturstudien undersöktes framgångsfaktorer för värdeerbjudanden och kundinvolvering samt svar på hur kundinvolvering kan underlättas för nystartade företag.  Fallstudien utfördes på ett nystartat företag inom EdTech-sektorn där ett värdeerbjudande som skapats enbart av företaget (utan kundinvolvering) jämfördes med ett nytt värdeerbjudande som skapats under fallstudien, med kundinvolvering. Båda placerades i en värdeerbjudande-canvas. Det kundinvolverade värdeerbjudandet baserades på tio intervjuer med kunder och potentiella kunder i målgruppen.       Resultat                         Resultatet visar att det kundinvolverade värdeerbjudandet var bredare, mer omfattande och inkluderade fler viktiga kundbehov. Dessutom så är risken för att missa latenta behov låg. För att underlätta kundinvolvering i nystartade företag tyder resultaten på att kundinvolveringen inte får kosta mycket tid och pengar. Sociala medier kan användas som en plattform för att utvinna generisk och bred information om kunder medan några få djupa relationer med kunder kan generera djupare förståelser kring kundens behov. Resultaten tyder också på att en tredje part kan genera objektiv information om nyckelkunder på ett tids och kostnadseffektivt sätt.

The number of companies who base their business model on digital platforms has increased in the recent years. Successful examples of digital platforms are e.g., Airbnb, Klarna or Uber. Compared to traditional linear value chains the value creation process in digital platforms is characterized by co-creation between multiple actors who exchange resources through interactions to mutually create value. Because of this fundamental difference in the value creation process it is necessary to research value creation in digital platform. Screening the literature has however shown that there is research gap in understandthe value creation process in digital platforms. Therefore, this thesis aims to understand this context by conducting a case study-based research. For this purpose, the start-up company Eljun is chosen that creates a digital wallet for customers to proceed payments for sustainable transportations. By conducting semi-structured interviews with the central actors of the platform we received insights that allow us to answer the three research questions. The value proposition canvas for the first research question has shown that the technical integration, costs, and lack of uncertainty are negative perceived values by the actors and positive values result from synergy effects in the platform like enhancing reach and customer experience by offering complementary services. For the second question we appliedthe view of service-dominant logic to analyse what facilitates value cocreation in the platform which led to the following themes: Adopting customer centric approach, stimulating purposeful communication, fostering collaborative development, cultivating transparent and fair interaction. For the third questions we derived barriers and motivators for value co-creation that are connected to a shared mission, competition, organizational & industrial readiness, number of actors and end-users, and the design of boundary resources.

A rapid development with many innovations has happened in recent years. Nevertheless, more than half of all innovations fail, why it is important to understand the customers: their demand, their needs and their benefits. Hence, the purpose of this study is to develop a value proposition for a high technological product in rain measurement, called Ericsson Weather Data (EWD). Since it is a technology-driven product, it is necessary to understand the potential customers to determine the product's market potential. Therefore, semi-structured interviews have been conducted with potential users in Sweden. The purpose has been to understand how they use rain data, which challenges and improvement opportunities there are with current rain data and which the most prominent value drivers are. Our empirical findings show that most of rain data in Sweden is free and published online by public entities. However, the current measurements are one-point measurements, which leads to information losses. This complicates the assessment of rain damages, why there is a great desire for increased spatial resolution. In addition, there is a need for better information regarding local cloudbursts. We have developed a value proposition, matched to the customers’ needs. EWD measures rainfall using the existing mobile network, which is more deployed and achieves a better spatial resolution than the traditional equipment. In addition, EWD measures rain data with an interval of ten seconds, generating tighter (more) information about local cloudbursts. As cloudbursts and spatial resolution were highlighted as the most important factors, a value proposition with resonating focus has been developed, meaning that we focus on these two factors. / En snabb utveckling med många innovationer har skett under senare år. Trots det misslyckas mer än hälften av alla innovationer, varför det blir allt viktigare att förstå kunderna: deras efterfrågan, deras behov och deras nytta. Syftet med det här arbetet är att utveckla ett värdeerbjudande för en högteknologisk produkt inom regnmätning, kallad Ericsson Weather Data (EWD). Då det är en teknikdriven produkt, är det nödvändigt att förstå de potentiella kunderna för att avgöra produktens marknadspotential. Därav har semi-strukturerade intervjuer genomförts med potentiella kunder i Sverige. Syftet har varit att förstå hur de använder regn data, vilka utmaningar och förbättringsmöjligheter de ser med nuvarande regndata och vilka de främsta värdedrivarna är. Våra empiriska resultat visar att majoriteten av den data som används i Sverige är gratis och publiceras online av statliga myndigheter. Dock, är nuvarande mätningar enpunktsmätningar, vilket leder till att information går förlorad. Detta bidrar till svårbedömliga skadevalideringar, varför det råder en stor önskan om en ökad geografisk täckning. Dessutom finns ett behov av bättre information om lokala skyfall. Vi har utvecklat ett erbjudande, utifrån kundernas behov. EWD mäter regn med hjälp av det befintliga mobila nätverket, som är mer utspritt och uppnår därav en bättre geografisk täckning än den traditionella utrustningen. Dessutom mäter EWD regndata med ett intervall på tio sekunder, vilket genererar tätare (mer) information om lokal skyfall. Eftersom skyfall och geografisk täckning lyfts fram som de viktigaste faktorerna, har ett värdeerbjudande med resonating focus utvecklats, vilket innebär att vi fokuserar på dessa två parametrar.