A company reconstruction is an alternative procedure, for companies in payment difficulty, to receivership. Those in any kind of relationship with the ailing company ends up in a dif- ficult situation at a company reconstruction, as in any case when someone is in financial difficulties. Not only is there a risk for the providers not to get paid, the costumers are also at risk if the reconstruction company does not fulfil their agreement. These kinds of rela- tionships are controlled by a contractual relationship. Therefore the regulation has to con- tain how to deal with these contracts when the ailing company no longer can fulfil its obli- gations of the contract. In combination with this, the number of franchise companies is growing in Sweden. Franchise is where a franchisor grants a franchisee intellectual property rights for a fee. In a company reconstruction the franchise relationship becomes another important aspect to take into account because of the degree of dependence between the franchisor and the franchisee. Further the obligations are more comprehensive in the fran- chise agreement than in many other agreements. The question here is how a franchise rela- tionship is affected by a company reconstruction of the other party. This has two perspec- tives; first the contractual relationship between the parties, and second how their coopera- tion affects the end of the reconstruction.

The contractual matter in this case is not statutory in Sweden. Therefore analogies are used in these kind of situations. The conclusion of this thesis is that problems occurs and for that reason an extended statutory regarding franchise relationships would be beneficial. On the other hand, the franchise relationship can be beneficial when one of the parties is in a company reconstruction. The close cooperation and support between the parties weighs out the disadvantages in this case.