Background: Industrial decarbonisation is accelerating interest in circular manufacturing. In metalworking, metal cutting tool manufacturers are influential because their position as an OEM means tool design, service offerings, and take back arrangements shape material recovery and use phase performance.

Purpose: This study examines how a metal cutting tool manufacturer mobilises dynamic capabilities (sensing, seizing, and reconfiguring) to support circular transition, and clarifies the organisational routines that stabilise these capabilities.

Methodology: A qualitative single-case study draws on 18 semi-structured interviews, documents, and observations, analysed through thematic coding and a dynamic-capabilities lens.

Findings: The studied OEM supports circularity by (i) sensing regulatory, technological, and customer shifts and translating them into design and service priorities; (ii) seizing opportunities through pilots and revised commercial logics; and (iii) reconfiguring products, processes, and roles to enable return, reconditioning, and recycling at scale. Data-enabled learning and partner collaboration strengthen each stage.

Originality and value: The paper extends research on circular transitions by showing how dynamic capabilities become durable through routines, governance structures, and collaboration mechanisms in the context of a metal cutting tool manufacturer.

Conclusion: Dynamic capabilities offer a structured pathway for an OEM to drive circularity, effectively translating strategic environmental intent into scalable practice. While this provides a strong framework, future research should test its transferability across different industrial sectors and regulatory environments.

Increased circular behaviours in Small and Medium-sized (SME) manufacturing companies would strongly contribute to a more circular economy. However, previous research has identified that the development and adoption of a circular economy hindered by behavioural barriers on organisational as well as individual level. With a specific focus on cemented carbide tooling that is frequently used in machining operations, this paper aims to identify actors and interactions between actors that influence circular behaviours related to acquisition, utilisation, and end-of-life activities in manufacturing companies and how circular behaviour can be enabled based on these roles. Findings show that there are several actors with the potential to positively influence the transition to a circular economy if they adopt pro-circular behaviours, e.g. Operators, production planners, production technicians, as well as top management. Also, purchasing professionals are a central actor deeply involved in both recommendations and execution of decisions particularly related to acquisition activities; a framework for intervention is suggested to enable circular behaviours at all organisation levels based on organisational hierarchy and control planned behaviour theory (TPB). 

Manufacturing faces growing regulatory and market pressures to reduce the use of primary raw materials and preserve value throughout a product's lifecycle. In the metalworking sector, cemented carbide cutting tools present a high-value circular opportunity as they contain critical raw materials. However, successful recovery depends on tight coordination across a fragmented ecosystem that includes global tool manufacturers, small- and medium-sized enterprise (SME) machining firms, reconditioning service providers (RSPs), and recyclers. In practice, this coordination is often weak. Due to unclear decision rights, misaligned incentives, and trapped lifecycle data, cutting tools are frequently discarded before full utilisation or routed to lower-value recovery channels.

This thesis explores how the metalworking industry can transition from fragmented, single-firm initiatives to systemic ecosystem orchestration. Employing a Design Science Research approach combined with an embedded case study of a metal-cutting tools ecosystem in southern Sweden, the research is structured around two interconnected studies.

The first study investigates current collaboration dynamics and structural constraints across the value chain to answer the first research question. It demonstrates that ecosystem collaboration is not a binary state but a developmental continuum. This analysis culminates in the Circular Collaboration Maturity Ladder, which shows that progressing from transactional exchanges to true network orchestration requires clarifying decision roles, standardising comparable evidence, and institutionalising feedback loops.

The second study addresses the second research question by translating these empirical constraints into formal orchestration requirements across governance, information, and operational domains. It introduces the Circular Collaboration for Ecosystem Opportunities Mapping Canvas. This diagnostic artefact helps organisations systematically pinpoint internal capability gaps, search for optimal ecosystem partners, and align their collaborative actions with appropriate governance models. Furthermore, the study introduces the concept of minimum viable evidence, arguing that robust circular verification does not require heavy, comprehensive digitisation. Instead, it requires proportionate, low-friction datasets that protect SME data sovereignty and fit naturally into existing shopfloor workflows.

Theoretically, this thesis extends the application of dynamic capabilities from an internal actor’s organisation strategy to ecosystem orchestration. It helps bridge the gap between macro-level focal-firm ambitions and the micro-operational realities of the SME shopfloor. Industrially, the research offers frameworks intended to help practitioners design incentive-aligned service models that can support circularity as a more viable and secure choice across the metalworking supply chain studied.

Game-based learning becomes increasingly valuable as engineering education adapts to industry trends and the need for interdisciplinary skills. This study examines a multidisciplinary master’s course on the efficacy of board games at a Swedish university. It promotes teamwork and engagement with tactile board games. The game’s effectiveness is evaluated through iterative design, testing, questionnaires, and observations, focusing on engagement, learning outcomes, and user experience. The findings indicate that the board game improves student motivation, collaboration, and understanding of real-world engineering challenges by allowing them to apply theoretical knowledge in a structured, interactive environment. The study provides (1) a validated framework for developing educational board games for interdisciplinary contexts, (2) empirical evidence supporting physical game-based learning in engineering education, and (3) practical insights for educators seeking to implement similar approaches in their courses. The study concludes that well-designed board games enhance interdisciplinary engineering learning, with implications for educational and industrial training contexts.

Due to environmental pressures and limited raw material availability, the adoption of resource-efficient approaches is becoming increasingly important in the metalworking sector. This thesis focuses on tungsten carbide metal cutting tools, which present significant challenges for circular transitions owing to their critical material composition and high performance demands. The main objective is to identify practices, frameworks, and digital solutions that support a shift from linear to circular models in metalworking, with particular attention to traceability, collaboration, and lifecycle management.

The research design encompasses interviews, workshops, and on-site observations conducted with Swedish small and medium-sized enterprises in collaboration with a global tool manufacturer. By integrating these empirical insights with theoretical perspectives on circular economy, the study explores how a dynamic QR-code system can facilitate real-time data exchange, enhance reconditioning processes, and foster shared accountability. The analysis highlights frequent inefficiencies in material handling, limited communication across the supply chain, and fragmented decision-making procedures, all of which contribute to resource wastage and less circular production systems.

Key findings included several important points. First, Structured traceability solutions enhanced coordination, ensuring that worn tools were retrieved or remanufactured in a timely manner. Second, holistic production system thinking helps companies align their strategic aims with everyday shop-floor practices, thus bridging the gap between sustainability goals and operational realities. Finally, robust stakeholder engagement—spanning designers, operators, and refurbishing partners—proves vital for establishing a more efficient, digitally integrated network of tool users.

It can be concluded that combining collaborative frameworks, digital traceability, and system-wide decision-making offers a path for the metalworks sector to remain competitive while significantly reducing its environmental footprint. By integrating these measures into existing workflows, SMEs and larger enterprises can enhance resource utilization, extend tool lifespans, and improve their sustainability in an evolving global marketplace.

This research examines how sustainable product design education can address the deficit in green talent. It presents a framework for a structured curriculum in product design, with hands-on activities, industry-specific case studies, and best practices in alternative design development. The impact of technologies like additive manufacturing on design is considered. Findings demonstrate that knowledge of technological capabilities, industry specific understanding, and proficiency in analytical tools such as Life Cycle Assessments contribute to sustainable designs mitigating a green talent gap.

The transition towards a circular economy requires an overarching perspective that recognises the dynamic and interdisciplinary nature of our current economic growth landscape. Circular economy inherently involves numerous stakeholders across the product life cycle. To establish efficient circular economy practices among these actors, this study suggests a novel framework for developing collaborative and interdisciplinary decision-making tools. By looking into relevant literature, organising a workshop, and analysing standard tools used in a circular economy like KPIs, risk analysis, Cost-Benefit Analysis, etc., we managed to capture the multidisciplinary challenges and dynamics faced by stakeholders of the circular business model. The contribution of this paper is the development of a framework that bridges requirement management techniques from product development practices with circular economy principles to facilitate effective decision-making processes. The framework effectively balances diverse stakeholder requirements, addressing uncertainties and multi-ownership challenges through product life cycles. This framework may be used to validate existing tools used by businesses and systematically develop new ones when needed. By facilitating collaboration around the circular economy, this framework not only reduces the environmental impact of economic growth but also encourages society to move towards more collective efforts to achieve sustainability. Finally, this article highlights the importance of a transdisciplinary approach in a systematic and effective transition to a circular economy.

This study investigates the transition to a circular economy in the metal cutting tools industry, highlighting collaboration challenges and lifecycle management. We propose a framework that fosters designer-user collaboration, enhancing circularity and sustainability through improved lifecycle oversight and information sharing, as evidenced by our case study findings.