Swedish firm Fortnox commits €4.5 million to research on what makes businesses succeed
Swedish business software scale-up Fortnox is funding a ten-year, €4.5 million research partnership with the Stockholm School of Economics to study what truly drives company success. The initiative questions whether commonly used performance metrics actually capture sustainable value.
Swedish cloud software company Fortnox has agreed to a ten-year partnership with the Stockholm School of Economics (SSE), committing €4.5 million (50 million kronor) to fund a new research centre and professorship dedicated to studying business performance measurement.
Fortnox CEO Tommy Eklund said the company wants to understand what genuinely enables businesses of all sizes — from a small hair salon in Växjö to a mid-sized construction firm in Gothenburg or an accounting practice in Stockholm — to succeed and contribute to a prosperous economy.
Founded in 2001 in Växjö, Fortnox started as a Swedish accounting software provider and has since grown into a major cloud-based platform used by small and medium-sized businesses and accounting firms. Its offerings span bookkeeping, invoicing, payroll and financial administration, giving it close insight into how companies track their operations. Since 2025, Fortnox has been owned by European investment group EQT, which took the company private that year.
Rethinking KPIs
The new Center for Responsible Performance Measurement will examine how organisations define, measure and pursue success, and what can be overlooked when management becomes overly focused on KPIs and other targets. The question carries particular weight for startups, whose founders are routinely expected to track growth, revenue, retention and other metrics that shape decisions on funding, product development and team resources.
SSE Vice-Chancellor Lars Strannegård welcomed the support, saying it would allow the school to build long-term knowledge in the field while preserving academic independence. Findings from the centre will be made public, and Fortnox intends to apply insights from the research to develop new tools for its own customers.
