Hybrid governance structures between markets and hierarchies in many industries, e.g., in energy and telecommunications, challenge antitrust and regulation policy. The paper focuses on the theoretical and methodological basis provided by the New Institutional Economics (NIE) for analyzing the...

We analyze the competitive effects of backward vertical integration by a partially vertically integrated firm that competes with non-integrated firms both upstream and downstream. We show that vertical integration is procompetitive under fairly general conditions. It can be anticompetitive only...

In Italy, fixed telecommunications were liberalised 15 years ago, but the incumbent is still the dominant operator. The Italian antitrust authority has recently fined Telecom Italia for margin squeeze and technical sabotage, proving that the incumbent still has the incentive and the power to...