By Marcus Holgersson
Congratulations to Julia Lundstedt and Nora Karlsson Kazeem on finishing their studies in Industrial Engineering and Management at Chalmers tekniska högskola! This spring I have had the great honor to supervise their master thesis work on circular business models among firms in the middle of the value chain, entitled “Stuck in the middle of the value chain: The investment company’s role in mitigating its subsidiaries’ circular challenges”.
Their work contributes by providing insights on the circularity challenges and solutions among companies that are positioned in the middle of the value chain, typically competing heavily on price and with limited power and control over what’s happening upstream and downstream. This group of firms is often forgotten when we talk about circular business models, yet we are all dependent on their important contributions in the economy. In this thesis Julia and Nora let them take center stage. These firms are commonly owned by investment companies, and Julia and Nora continued their work by investigating how a parent company can support its subsidiaries in addressing circular challenges. Recommendations are provided to investment companies, enabling them to address sustainability concerns while improving competitiveness.
Supervising Julia and Nora has been a great experience, and I’m impressed by what they have achieved. They have been eager to read up on the relevant literature, travel around Sweden to visit and interview companies in the steel industry, and they really worked hard to carve out their own contribution to the literature and translate that to actionable advice for practitioners. On top of that, every supervision meeting has been great fun and full of energy! My best wishes to Julia and Nora in their future careers!
