This paper analyzes endogenous efficiency gains from mergers. It considers oligopolistic homogeneous good markets and duopolistic and triopolistic markets under product differentiation (quantity and price competition). In a two-stage game, firms invest in cost-reducing innovation (with and without mergers) and then compete in output/prices. It is found that in homogeneous good markets, all poss...

A network effect exists in many industries (e.g., newspaper publishing, media, software) in which a seller sells both a primary and a secondary product (e.g., a newspaper publisher sells newspapers to readers and advertising space to advertisers), and the value of the secondary product depends on the size of the user base of the primary product. This paper examines the competitive implications ...

Using a large sample of diversified firms from 38 countries we investigate the influence of several national-level institutional factors or ‘institutional voids’ on the value of corporate diversification. Specifically, we explore whether the presence of frictions in a country’s capital markets, labor markets, and product markets, affect the excess value of diversified firms. We find that the va...

Information and communication technology (ICT) products exhibit positive network effects.The dynamic process of ICT markets evolution has two intrinsic characteristics: (1) customers are influenced by each others’ purchasing decision; (2) customers are intelligent agents with bounded rationality.Guided by complex systems theory, we construct an agent-based model and simulate on complex networks...

The full impact of trade costs in segmenting product markets cannot be captured by considering aggregate prices or in the absence of information on the direction of trade. We address this problem by utilizing product-specific prices, cross-sectional productivity indices, and bilateral trade flows, allowing us to identify the probable source of any one product. We show that trade costs in the fo...

In this study, we re-examine the failure of formation of electronic markets for the air cargo industry. Using an economic theory called Core Theory, we provide an alternate explanation. Core theory explains why: a) such a failure might have been anticipated and b) the failure to form an electronic market may in fact be beneficial for the industry as a whole.