The Chair and the new center will allow SSE to broaden its research and educational capabilities relating to the area of family enterprise, which plays an important role for entrepreneurship, innovation and economic and social development.

As part of the sponsorship, SEB is providing SEK 6 million per year over a period of five years, with the possibility of a five-year extension. This will serve as the basis for SSE’s new center, led by the newly established SEB Chair in Entrepreneurship and Family Business. The vision is to become a Nordic center of excellence with global impact in the area of family office and family enterprise.

“We are very grateful for SEB’s sponsorship of the new Chair in Entrepreneurship and Family Business and its support in part-funding and laying the foundation for our new center focusing on family enterprise in the Nordic region,” says Lars Strannegård, President of SSE. “SEB has a long history of supporting entrepreneurs and family-owned businesses, and we are very excited to have a partner that so strongly shares our interest in, and commitment to, this area.”

“The foundation for the center is hereby secured and we have ongoing dialogues with potential additional sponsors of the new center which we are looking forward to being able to announce in a near future,” says Lars Strannegård.

The center will focus on three interrelated areas within the context of family enterprise in the Nordic region: innovation and entrepreneurship, ownership and governance, and philanthropy and impact investment.

World-renowned expert to head new center
The Board of Directors of SSE has awarded the Chair in Entrepreneurship and Family Business to Mattias Nordqvist, a world-renowned scholar in the area of family enterprise and recently identified by Family Capital as one of the world’s 15 most influential academics in the field.

Professor Mattias Nordqvist joined SSE in 2019, having been an Associate Dean of Jönköping International Business School (JIBS) where he also served as the Director of the Center for Family Entrepreneurship and Ownership (CeFEO). Prior to that, Mattias Nordqvist was the co-Director of the Global STEP Project on Family Enterprising at Babson College (USA). He has also been a visiting professor at Babson College and Bocconi (Italy).

“Family enterprises represent the most common form of business organization in the world,” says Mattias Nordqvist. “This is particularly evident in Sweden and in our neighboring Nordic countries, which is home to some of the world’s most famous family-owned brands. While these companies contribute hugely to entrepreneurship, innovation and the development of society, their importance clearly merits more attention in the academic world. I am therefore very glad that SSE, with the support of SEB, is now establishing a new research center in this field and am very honored to have been awarded this professorship.”

Historical ties to family entrepreneurship

SSE is a private institution that partly relies on corporate partnerships for funding. The Wallenberg family, which founded SEB in 1856, has supported SSE since it was founded in 1909. Back then, a number of industry leaders led by K. A. Wallenberg and Olof A. Söderberg committed to the idea of funding a private business school. The Wallenberg and Söderberg families remain supporters of the school today, along with other business families that have joined over the years – including the Ax:son Jo hnson, Bonnier, Lundberg and Persson families. SSE’s expanded focus on entrepreneurs and family business is thus well rooted both in the school’s heritage and in Sweden’s modern history.

“Benefit to family enterprises”
Through the sponsorship, SEB will gain access to insights and fact-based knowledge in the area of family enterprise and allow SEB and SSE to collaborate on a number of activities, including seminars, roundtable discussions and education.

“We are very proud and happy to be able to support SSE in advancing the scope of its research and education within this field. It will be of great benefit to family enterprises and business families, the organizations that support them, and to the societies and communities in which they operate.” says William Paus, Head of SEB’s division Private Wealth Management & Family Office.

For more information, please contact:

Mattias Nordqvist
Professor, Chair in Entrepreneurship and Family Business
Email: mattias.nordqvist@hhs.se
Phone: +46 (0)736-51 76 10

Lars Strannegård 
President of the Stockholm School of Economics
Email: lars.strannegard@hhs.se
Phone: +46 (0)8-736 90 12