Author: Irina SuleymanovaPublisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :
Book Description
Bertrand Competition in Markets with Network Effects and Switching Costs
Author: Irina SuleymanovaCoordination and Lock-In
Author: Joseph FarrellPublisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
Switching costs and network effects bind customers to vendors if products are incompatible, locking customers or even markets in to early choices. Lock-in hinders customers from changing suppliers in response to (predictable or unpredictable) changes in efficiency, and gives vendors lucrative ex post market power-over the same buyer in the case of switching costs (or brand loyalty), or over others with network effects. Firms compete ex ante for this ex post power, using penetration pricing, introductory offers, and price wars. Such competition for the market or life-cycle competition can adequately replace ordinary compatible competition, and can even be fiercer than compatible competition by weakening differentiation. More often, however, incompatible competition not only involves direct efficiency losses but also softens competition and magnifies incumbency advantages. With network effects, established firms have little incentive to offer better deals when buyers' and complementors' expectations hinge on non-efficiency factors (especially history such as past market shares), and although competition between incompatible networks is initially unstable and sensitive to competitive offers and random events, it later tips to monopoly, after which entry is hard, often even too hard given incompatibility. And while switching costs can encourage small-scale entry, they discourage sellers from raiding one another's existing customers, and so also discourage more aggressive entry. Because of these competitive effects, even inefficient incompatible competition is often more profitable than compatible competition, especially for dominant firms with installed-base or expectational advantages. Thus firms probably seek incompatibility too often. We therefore favor thoughtfully pro-compatibility public policy.
Price Competition in Two-Sided Markets with Heterogeneous Consumers and Network Effects
Author: Lapo FilistrucchiPublisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 52
Book Description
We model a two-sided market with heterogeneous customers and two heterogeneous network effects. In our model, customers on each market side care differently about both the number and the type of customers on the other side. Examples of two-sided markets are online platforms or daily newspapers. In the latter case, for instance, readership demand depends on the amount and the type of advertisements. Also, advertising demand depends on the number of readers and the distribution of readers across demographic groups. There are feedback loops because advertising demand depends on the numbers of readers, which again depends on the amount of advertising, and so on. Due to the difficulty in dealing with such feedback loops when publishers set prices on both sides of the market, most of the literature has avoided models with Bertrand competition on both sides or has resorted to simplifying assumptions such as linear demands or the presence of only one network effect. We address this issue by first presenting intuitive sufficient conditions for demand on each side to be unique given prices on both sides. We then derive sufficient conditions for the existence and uniqueness of an equilibrium in prices. For merger analysis, or any other policy simulation in the context of competition policy, it is important that equilibria exist and are unique. Otherwise, one cannot predict prices or welfare effects after a merger or a policy change. The conditions are related to the own- and cross-price effects, as well as the strength of the own and cross network effects. We show that most functional forms used in empirical work, such as logit type demand functions, tend to satisfy these conditions for realistic values of the respective parameters. Finally, using data on the Dutch daily newspaper industry, we estimate a flexible model of demand which satisfies the above conditions and evaluate the effects of a hypothetical merger and study the effects of a shrinking market for offline newspapers.
How Do Switching Costs Affect Market Concentration and Prices in Network Industries?
Author: Jiawei ChenPublisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
I investigate the effects of switching costs on the market outcome in network industries using a dynamic duopoly model of price competition in the presence of an outside option. I find that the role of switching costs depends on network effects and the outside option. Without a viable outside option, high switching costs can neutralize the tendency towards high market concentration associated with network effects, but with a viable outside option, switching costs increase market concentration. Furthermore, switching costs lower prices if network effects are modest and there exists a viable outside option, but generally raise prices otherwise.
Coordination and Lock-in
Author: Joseph V. FarrellPublisher:
ISBN:
Category : Adjustment costs
Languages : en
Pages : 129
Book Description
Switching Costs and Dynamic Price Competition in Network Industries
Author: Jiawei ChenPublisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
Motivated by policy makers' recent interest in reducing switching costs in various network industries to increase competition, this paper investigates how switching costs affect market outcome in such industries. The results show that the effects of switching costs on market concentration and prices critically depend on two factors: the strength of network effects and the quality of the outside good. For example, switching costs lower prices if network effects are modest and the outside good is attractive, but raise prices otherwise. Therefore, policy makers need to carefully evaluate those two factors in order to make informed decisions.
The Economics of Network Industries
Author: Oz ShyPublisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1139432273
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 264
Book Description
This book introduces upper-level undergraduates, graduate students, and researchers to the latest developments in network economics, one of the fastest-growing fields in all industrial organization. Network industries include the Internet, e-mail, telephony, computer hardware and software, music and video players, and service operations in the banking, legal, and airlines industries among many others. The work offers an overview of the subject matter as well as investigations about specific industries. It conveys the essential features of how strategic interactions between firms are affected by network activity, as well as covering social interaction and its influence on consumers' choices of products and services. Virtually no calculus is used in the text, and each chapter ends with a series of exercises and selected references. The text may be used for both one- and two-semester courses.
A Duopoly Model of Switching Costs and Network Effects
Author: Renzo CorriasRecent Advances in the Analysis of Competition Policy and Regulation
Author: Joseph E. HarringtonPublisher: Edward Elgar Publishing
ISBN: 1781005699
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 401
Book Description
'This volume collects a number of original, cutting-edge contributions that take the reader swiftly and easily to the frontier of research on most of the current hot topics in industrial organization, antitrust and regulation. Skillfully edited by two outstanding leaders in the field, the volume will be a precious source for students, researchers and practitioners that need to figure out what research has achieved in recent years on these important policy issues.' Giancarlo Spagnolo, SITE Stockholm School of Economics and University of Tor Vergata, Sweden This state-of-the-art volume highlights important recent research contributions covering all the significant themes surrounding competition policy and regulation, including financial regulation and multisided markets. Bringing scholars and policymakers to the frontiers of research and addressing the critical issues of the day, the book presents original important new theoretical and empirical results. The distinguished contributors include: P. Agrel, K. Alexander, J. Crémer, X. Dassiou, G. Deltas, F. Etro, L. Filistrucchi, P. Fotis, M. Gilli, J. Harrington Jr, T. Huertas, M. Ivaldi, B. Jullien, V. Marques, M. Peitz, Y. Spiegel, E. Tarrantino and G. Wood. Recent Advances in the Analysis of Competition Policy and Regulation will prove insightful for academic economists, consultants and policymakers interested in these fields.
Industrial Organization
Author: Paul BelleflammePublisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1139485245
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 725
Book Description
Industrial Organization: Markets and Strategies provides an up-to-date account of modern industrial organization that blends theory with real-world applications. Written in a clear and accessible style, it acquaints the reader with the most important models for understanding strategies chosen by firms with market power and shows how such firms adapt to different market environments. It covers a wide range of topics including recent developments on product bundling, branding strategies, restrictions in vertical supply relationships, intellectual property protection, and two-sided markets, to name just a few. Models are presented in detail and the main results are summarized as lessons. Formal theory is complemented throughout by real-world cases that show students how it applies to actual organizational settings. The book is accompanied by a website containing a number of additional resources for lecturers and students, including exercises, answers to review questions, case material and slides.