We examine the incentives of a monopolistic search engine, funded by advertising, to provide reliable search results. We distinguish two types of search results: sponsored and organic (not-paid-for). Organic results are most important in searches for online content, while sponsored results are...

This paper analyzes a two-sided market model in which platforms compete for advertisers and users. Platforms are differentiated from the users' perspective but are homogenous for advertisers. I show that, although there is Bertrand competition for advertisers, platforms obtain positive margins...

Two-sided markets consist of platforms that need to bring both retail consumers and complementary goods producers on board to be successful. Consumer adoption of these platforms can often hinge on the presence and magnitude of indirect network effects — the positive feedback loop where a...

We analyze the market for online and offline media in a model of two-dimensional spatial competition where media outlets sell content and advertising space. Consumer preferences are distributed along the style and type of news coverage where the distance costs may vary across dimensions. For...

Empirical models of differentiated product demand are widely used by both academics and practitioners. While these methods treat carefully the potential endogeneity of price, until recently they have assumed the number and characteristics of the products offered by firms are exogenous. This...

We illustrate conditions under which a trade platform selling its own products alongside third-party sellers benefits or harms consumers. This benefits consumers by lowering prices in a suite of models: a gatekeeper platform facing a competitive fringe of sellers, when fringe sellers also have...

This article examines how firms facing volatile input prices and holding some degree of market power in their product market link their risk management and their production or pricing strategies. This issue is relevant in many industries ranging from manufacturing to energy retailing, where...

We study firms' incentives to create switching costs using a four-period model consisting of two consecutive price-competing stages intervened by options to create switching costs early (before price competition) and late (during price competition). Acknowledging that many real/social switching...

Experimental evidence suggests that consumers are affected by reference prices and by relative price differences (“relative thinking”). A linear-city model of two retailers that sell two goods suggests how this consumer behavior affects firm strategy and market outcomes. A simple model...

In procurement settings, mergers among suppliers reduce buyers' choice sets and can harm buyers by eliminating their preferred supplier or reducing their negotiating leverage. I develop a stochastic economic model that predicts the effects of mergers based on information that commonly is...