We consider platform competition in a two-sided market, where the two sides (buyers and sellers) have ex-ante uncertainty and ex-post asymmetric information concerning the value of a new technology. We find that platform competition may lead to a market failure: competition may result in a lower...

We analyze a model of cost-reducing R&D and compatibility decisions by two platforms. After an exogenous improvement in the efficiency of R&D, each platform has a heightened incentive to make its software incompatible with the rival's hardware device to avoid being dominated in the hardware...

Peer-to-Peer (P2P) technologies are often seen as a threat by copyright owners because they encourage piracy by making digital copies easier. In response, major record companies have come up with new devices designed to protect original material, and lobbied to reinforce legal protection. We...

We study the licensing incentives of an independent input producer owning a patented product innovation which allows the downstream firms to improve the quality of their final goods. We consider a general two-part tariff contract for both outside and incumbent innovators. We find that technology...

We present an equilibrium model where the demand side of the market determines the strategic incentives of firms when considering the introduction of technologically superior products (TSPs) and the subsequent dynamic evolution of the market configuration. Market demand is built on conventional...

General purpose technologies (GPTs) have been important drivers of industrial revolutions and economic development, but their link to standards has not been analyzed systematically. We document that all of the most common examples of GPTs—steam, railway, electricity and information (and...

Complementor innovation is an essential form of value co-creation in open platform ecosystems. However, the increasing platform fragmentation, i.e., users in the ecosystem adopting different versions of the platform technologies, has significantly hindered complementor innovation. For instance,...

For enthusiasts, distributed ledger technology and smart contract technology promise a future of frictionless interactions and decentralisation. In practice, however, it is widely acknowledged that this vision faces significant challenges. These include legal challenges, technological...

This paper addresses the question of the software companies’ timing of adoption of the open source software (OSS) business models comprising the supply of OSS products and/or services. The game-theoretic technology adoption models do not explain well the observed diffusion patterns of the OSS...

The paper investigates empirically the decision of firms to adopt Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) based on a comprehensive specification of a rank model of technology adoption (complemented by epidemic effects) using firm-level data for the Swiss business sector. The explanatory...