‘Double marginalization’ problems: evidence from the Korean fixed-to-mobile service market

In this paper, examination of the possibility of a ‘double marginalization’ problem existing in the Korean telecommunication industry is conducted and suggestions are made for the provision of a new scheme to eliminate this possibility by changing the pricing system for fixed-to-mobile calls. Based on five key economic characteristics in the Korean mobile market, a simple model for double marginalization in the telecommunication market is introduced. Evidence was found to suggest that a double marginalization problem is likely to exist within Korea's telecommunication industry as it is presently structured, and that this problem is further likely to have an adverse effect on the industry by inflating the price of fixed-to-mobile calls. Two alternatives are proposed to effectively remedy this double marginalization issue. It is also shown that prices of fixed-to-mobile calls could be lowered by changing the caller pays principle into a receiver pays principle.     

Licensing Strategies in the Presence of Patent Thickets

Many key industries (e.g., biomedical, pharmaceuticals, telecommunications, and information technologies) are characterized by cumulative innovations, where the introduction of a new product or service often requires many complementary technologies. When these technologies are protected by intellectual property rights owned by many firms, patent thickets exist, which researchers have argued may hinder the development of cumulative innovations. Specifically, patent thickets may lead to excessive royalty burdens for potential licensees, which is called “royalty stacking,” and if such costs are passed on to consumers, prices of products based on cumulative technologies will be driven up, dubbed as “double marginalization.” The literature, however, does not address these issues under different forms of licensing contracts. This article develops a game‐theoretic model where a downstream firm seeks to license N patents that read on its product from upstream firms. It discusses a variety of licensing forms widely used in practice and attempts to discover whether royalty stacking and double marginalization occur under these forms of licenses. It also studies the impact of bargaining power between parties. It is found that when patent ownership becomes more fragmented, neither royalty stacking nor double marginalization occurs under profit‐based royalty, fixed fee, and hybrid licenses. Such problems occur only under pure quantity‐based or pure revenue‐based royalty licenses when the downstream firm's bargaining power is low. It is also shown that no matter how fragmented the ownership structure of patent is, hybrid licenses consisting of a fixed fee and a quantity‐ or revenue‐based royalty rate lead to the same market outcomes as a fully integrated firm that owns all the patents and the downstream market. This article has interesting implications for both research and practice. First, the results show that even under the same patent ownership structure, different forms of licenses lead to quite different market outcomes. Therefore, it is suggested that firms and policy makers pay more attention to contractual forms of licenses when trying to minimize the negative impact of patent thickets. Second, the extant literature has largely assumed that quantity‐based royalties are used, where double marginalization is the most severe. In practice, revenue‐based royalties are most common, under which double marginalization is much milder. Third, the results show that patent pools can be most effective in mitigating royalty stacking and double marginalization when quantity‐based or revenue‐based royalties are the sole or primary payment form, especially when downstream firms have low bargaining power.     

Expropriation and control rights: A dynamic model of foreign direct investment

This paper studies the strategic interaction between a foreign direct investor and a host country. We analyze how the investor can use his control rights to protect his investment if he faces the risk of “creeping expropriation” once his investment is sunk. It is shown that this hold-up problem may cause underinvestment if the outside option of the investor is too weak, and overinvestment if it is too strong. We also analyze the impact of spillover effects, we give a rationale for “tax holidays” and we examine how stochastic returns affect the strategic interaction of investor and host country.     

Market structure and quality determination for complementary products: Alliances and service quality in the airline industry

This paper explores the effect of market structure on quality determination for complementary products. The focus is on the airline industry and the effect of airline alliances on flight frequency, an important element of service quality. With zero layover cost, the choice of flight frequencies has the same double-marginalization structure as in the usual alliance model, leading to a higher frequency in the alliance case as double marginalization is eliminated, along with a lower full trip price and higher traffic. The surprising result of the paper emerges with high-cost layover time, where double marginalization in frequencies is absent and where an alliance reduces service quality via a lower frequency, with the full price potentially rising (in which case traffic falls).     

To invest or screen efficiently: a potential conflict in relationships governed by incomplete contracts

We consider a dynamic trade relationship where quality is not contractible and potential sellers retain quality-relevant private information. We show that the presence of an investment technology to improve the incumbent seller’s innate quality may impair the efficiency of the screening process. If the conflict is effective, the buyer has to induce an inefficient screening process or reduce the productivity of the investment technology. This conflict suggests that the hold-up problem may be more severe than predicted by models of incomplete contracts that assume complete information.     

基于制造业技术创新的战略性贸易政策与我国产业结构优化研究

文章采用理论分析、数理建模、实证分析等方法,对战略性贸易政策在制造业技术创新、产业结构升级与优化中的重要作用进行了研究。研究结果表明：（1）LZFTR（政府资金投入）与CJP（初级品）的相关系数r＝-0.964,LZFTR与ZCP（工业制成品）的相关系数r＝0.982（P＜0.01）。表明战略性贸易政策能够有效降低初级品出口比重,增加工业制品的出口比重,从而促进出口贸易结构不断升级与优化;（2） 战略性贸易政策对高技术制造业产品出口贸易固定效应、随机效应模型系数值均为正,战略性贸易政策政府研究发展补贴每增加100%,高技术产业对外贸易结构就会优化0.0042,说明战略性贸易政策对高技术制造业产品的外贸易结构变化有正向促进作用;（3）战略性贸易政策对各高技术制造行业贸易结构的影响不尽相同,其对医药制造业及各小类行业对外贸易出口产业结构优化均有明显的促进作用,其对仪器仪表出口贸易结构优化有着明显的促进作用,但是对医疗设备与器械制造出口贸易结构优化的促进作用并不显著。在此基础上作者提出了推动我国实现产业结构优化的相关战略性贸易政策建议,以期为提高我国制造业的自主创新能力,优化产业结构提供一定的理论参考。     

Vertical Structure and Patent Pools

It is well known that patent pools can enhance efficiency by eliminating the complements problem. This paper investigates how the presence of vertically integrated firms affects the economic impact of a patent pool. Without a patent pool, the presence of integrated firms may either increase or decrease the final product price as there are two countervailing effects – reduced double marginalization and raising rivals costs. However, when there is a patent pool, vertical integration always lowers the final product price. In conclusion, the economic efficiency arguments for patent pools are enhanced when some firms are vertically integrated.     

Resource complementarity and value capture in firm acquisitions: The role of intellectual property rights

Extant literature holds that firm acquisitions create value through innovation if the knowledge bases of the acquirer and the target complement each other. Little is known about the value that patents associated with a target's knowledge convey to the acquirer, i.e., their value in securing market exclusion and freedom to operate in R&D. We argue that such property rights hold preemptive power allowing firms to capture the value from combining complementary technologies and to realize gains from trade in strategic factor markets. Our results for a sample of 1,428 acquisitions indicate that—controlling for technological value—acquired preemptive power is an important determinant of the acquisition price, particularly when the acquirer is technology intensive and acquired patents are highly related to the acquirer's knowledge base. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Strategic planning as a complex and enabling managerial tool

Research summary : The role of the strategic planning process in the ongoing generation of innovative knowledge is vital to the survival and growth of a firm, especially when technologies and market conditions are rapidly changing. We analyze data from a survey of firms in high‐technology industries to determine whether it is possible to break the commonly experienced trade‐off between strategic planning's positive influence on firm profitability and its negative influence on firm innovation. We draw on Adler and Borys's (1996) conceptualization of bureaucratic process types to identify several firm characteristics that have the potential to affect whether employees perceive strategic planning as enabling to their creative endeavors. We find that contingent effects between strategic planning and the identified firm characteristics exist that can break the trade‐off. Managerial summary : A tension exits in the literature about whether strategic planning hurts or helps innovative activity. Our analysis of data from 227 business units in high‐technology industries indicates that strategic planning is a complex process that can be perceived by employees as enabling or coercive. Our results confirm that strategic planning negatively affects innovative activity but positively affects profitability for average firms. We find, however, controllable firm characteristics—risk‐taking and knowledge‐based reward systems—affect the trade‐off. Given the higher levels of risk‐taking and knowledge‐based reward systems, firms can use strategic planning to achieve both high returns on investment and a high level of innovative activity. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Platform competition: Strategic trade‐offs in platform markets

Because the literature on platform competition emphasizes the role of network effects, it prescribes rapidly expanding a network of platform users and complementary applications to capture entire markets. We challenge the unconditional logic of a winner‐take‐all (WTA) approach by empirically analyzing the dominant strategies used to build and position platform systems in the U.S. video game industry. We show that when platform firms pursue two popular WTA strategies concurrently and with equal intensity (growing the number and variety of applications while also securing a larger fraction of those applications with exclusivity agreements), it diminishes the benefits of each strategy to the point that it lowers platform performance. We also show that a differentiation strategy based on distinctive positioning improves a platform's performance only when a platform system is highly distinctive relative to its rivals. Our results suggest that platform competition is shaped by important strategic trade‐offs and that the WTA approach will not be universally successful. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

New Labour's Reform of Britain's Employment Law: The Devil is not only in the Detail but in the Values and Policy Too

The Labour government's goal of social partnership embodies a particular view of the appropriate role of labour within the employment relationship, which requires the marginalization of trade unionism as an autonomous force. Its programme of employment law reform combines a dual focus: first, the reaffirmation of measures that weaken workers' collective power through the exclusion of autonomous trade unionism, and second, initiatives to regulate the labour market, strengthen workers' rights within the employment relationship, and include enterprise‐confined, cooperative unions as subordinate 'partners'. However, the second policy dimension has been diluted because of the commitment to free‐market values.     

When does corporate venture capital add value for new ventures?

New ventures face a trade‐off when considering corporate venture capital (CVC) funding. Corporate investors can provide complementary assets that enhance the commercialization of new venture technologies. However, tight links with a particular corporate investor has drawbacks and may constrain new ventures from accessing complementary assets from diverse sources in an open market. Taking this trade‐off into account, we explore conditions under which CVC funding is beneficial to new ventures. Using a sample of computer, semiconductor, and wireless ventures, we find that CVC funding is particularly beneficial for new ventures when they require specialized complementary assets or operate in uncertain environments. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Complementarities and competition: Unpacking the drivers of entrants' technology choices in the solar photovoltaic industry

Entrants in new industries pursue distinct technologies in hopes of winning the technology competition and achieving sustainable competitive advantage. We draw on the complementary assets framework to predict entrants' technology choices in an emerging industry. Evidence from the global solar photovoltaic industry supports our arguments that entrants are more likely to choose technologies with higher technical performance and for which key complementary assets are available in the ecosystem. However, diversifying entrants are more likely to trade off superior performance for complementary asset availability whereas start‐up entrants are more likely to trade off complementary asset availability for superior performance. This difference is largely due to diversifying entrants with pre‐entry capabilities related to the industry. The study offers a novel illustration of how complementarities and competition shape entry strategies. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Horizontal subcontracting and investment in idle dispatchable power plants

We analyze horizontal subcontracting and show how idle production facilities can reduce contracting costs by credibly protecting against hold-up. Our analysis contributes to understanding competition between power firms that increasingly use intermittent generation sources. Their unilateral incentives to invest in maintaining underused units, such as dispatchable gas-fired plants, are underrated by plant profitability indicators. From a policy perspective, decentralized strategic investment incentives reduce the possible need for centralized security of supply measures. Our welfare analysis indicates that quantity competition can lead to a lower market-clearing price than price competition.     

A panel data analysis of code-sharing,antitrust immunity,and open skies treaties in international aviation markets

This paper estimates the effects of code-sharing, antitrust immunity, and Open Skies treaties on prices, output, and capacity using an eleven-year panel of U.S.-Europe data. Code-sharing and immunized alliances are found to have significantly lower prices than does traditional interline (multi-carrier) service, but the effects are smaller in magnitude than those found in previous results that rely on cross-sectional data. Statistical tests that prices for immunized alliance service are equal to online (single carrier) service often cannot be rejected, providing additional evidence that immunity grants allow immunized carriers to internalize a double marginalization problem. Estimated output effects, consistent with the price effects, show that alliances are associated with large increases in passenger volumes. Lastly, estimates suggest that capacity expansions associated with “Open Skies” treaties are due entirely to expansion by immunized carriers on routes between their hubs. I would like to thank the editor and an anonymous referee for their helpful comments. The views expressed in this paper do not reflect those of the US Department of Justice. All errors are my own     

Biotechnology Commercialization Strategies: Risk and Return in Interfirm Cooperation

The management and exploitation of biotechnological product innovation have proven to be more difficult than initially expected because the number of currently marketed biotechnological products is far from sufficient to counter deficits in pharmaceutical innovation. This study provides insight into the role of governance structures in interfirm cooperation and their effects on biotechnological product innovation and company success. Most of the existing literature regarding alliances and mergers and acquisitions (M&A) examines their effects on technology recipients' innovation performance. Here, the effects of alliances and M&A on both the innovation success and financial performance of technology suppliers (i.e., sources) are examined. Drawing from a sample of 220 human therapeutic biotechnology and biopharmaceutical firms over a period of 32 years (1980–2011), an analysis of the effects of biotechnology clusters, strategic alliances, and acquisitions is provided. This study reveals the existence of a risk‐return trade‐off for strategic alliances between biotech companies and larger, more established firms. Increased biotech company involvement in product development alliances decreases risk by increasing the likelihood of future product introductions. The trade‐off, however, is that biotech companies earn lower returns when their products are developed through such alliances. A similar risk‐return trade‐off effect is found for clusters. However, acquisitions generally affect both product introductions and product returns in a negative way. These findings have strategic implications not only for managing the development of biotechnological product innovations and technology platforms but also for commercialization strategies with respect to interfirm cooperation and risk reduction.     

Price and quality discrimination in durable goods monopoly with resale trading

We examine a durable goods monopolist’s optimal dynamic price and product quality strategy when buyers are rational and can trade used durables among themselves. In contrast to the usual credibility problem of the durable goods monopolist, intertemporal quality discrimination introduces a time-inconsistency problem of not raising prices against high-valuation consumers who delay purchase for quality upgrades. Resale trading ameliorates this time-inconsistency problem and allows the monopolist to effectively price discriminate, especially when the buyers are patient. The monopolist’s optimal price and quality offers in the new good market exhibit complex dynamic patterns, and new good prices can fall as product quality improves even in the absence of entry threats or learning economies. Initial quality distortions are followed by steady-state quality allocations that are always efficient for the high-valuation buyers, but sometimes also for the marginal consumer-types. Both the resale trading frequency and the price discount for secondhand goods are driven by the pace of strategic quality obsolescence in the new good market.     

俄罗斯能源外交战略与中俄油气合作

近年来，俄罗斯作为唯一油气净出口的世界性大国，不断推进能源外交战略；中国作为与之比邻而居的世界第二大石油消费国，却正在实施石油供应安全的国际化战略。然而。目前理论上显示的中俄能源合作的广阔前景，面对的却是双方能源贸易量微不足道的现实。对于中国石油安全来说，如何应对俄罗斯能源外交战略及其影响，实现中俄油气领域大规模合作，确保国家能源安全和经济安全。是一个迫切需要深入思考和研究的战略问题。     

Emergent patterns of strategy,environment and performance in a transition economy

Insights from the resource dependence approach, dynamic fit, and strategic choice theories are used to explore the strategies adopted by Chinese enterprises, their settings, and the relationship between strategy, environment, and performance. Results from 959 firms indicate that respondents operating under ‘more marketized’ institutional settings tend to locate themselves in more munificent environments and place greater emphasis on meeting customer needs. Firms in China do not trade off one strategic direction against another, and certain strategy/environment coalignments have significant implications for performance. In particular, performance is better in more marketized and munificent environments and amongst firms who adopt an ‘aggressive’ strategic posture. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

我国进出口贸易偏价格弹性的研究及应用

在过去的30年中,我国对外贸易结构发生了巨大的变化,与各国签订的双边和多边贸易协定越来越多,同时贸易过程中发生的摩擦也越来越频繁,那么弄清楚我国对外贸易各组成部分的相互替代和互补关系,对于调整和制定有效的贸易策略就具有重要的指导意义。本文采用完全灵活的对称标准二次型(Symmetric Normalized Quadratic)总函数,估计了1990—2010年我国主要对外贸易伙伴的进口和出口偏价格弹性。考察的贸易伙伴包括我国对外贸易中的16个主要国家和地区,展示了我国对外贸易的替代和互补关系图,以及这种关系的动态变化,最后利用这些替代和互补关系的结果总结了我国对外贸易策略的主旨。