Platforms like Uber, Google Search, and Hulu pervade the modern economic landscape. A platform caters to distinct but deeply-interdependent “sides” of customers that derive value or revenues from one another, such as the merchants and cardholders on a credit card network, or the advertisers...

The emergence of the multi-sided platform business model has had a profound impact on the news publishing industry. By acting as gatekeepers to news traffic, large online platforms have become unavoidable trading partners for news businesses, and exert substantial bargaining power in their...

Antitrust enforcement against anticompetitive platform most favored nations (MFN) provisions (also termed pricing parity provisions) can help protect competition in online markets. An online platform imposes a platform MFN when it requires that providers using its platform not offer their...

The US Supreme Court ruling in American Express marks a breakthrough for antitrust enforcement in two-sided markets. Not surprisingly, the ruling has sparked lively discussions in the antitrust law and economics community.The majority of the Court argues that if both groups of players are needed...

Digital platforms operate in multisided markets providing services through the internet to two or more distinct groups of users, between which there are indirect network effects. Direct network effects are frequently present within each group. Therefore, online platforms usually present both...

Platform businesses have been pivotal in the rise of the digital economy. Amazon is one example of a platform taking on the role of a quasi-regulator; an entity that is able to determine the terms of interaction on the platform. This intermediary position entails the danger of anti-competitive...

The ministerial proposal for a 10th amendment of the German competition law particularly addresses abuse control and seeks to tighten this pillar of competition policy against the background of the challenges from the digital economy. Next to extending the classic policy instruments of abuse...

The persistent dominance of US digital platforms relates to strategies that can be justified on efficiency grounds. However, these strategies might also offset competition and have ambiguous welfare effects. Overall, though, the economic literature does not provide a clear theoretical ground for...

This paper presents an overview of what economists can say about vertical constraints by multi-sided platforms at this stage in the development of our knowledge about the economics of these businesses. It describes the general procompetitive and anticompetitive uses of vertical restraints by...

This article addressed the problems of market definition, antitrust error, and digital platforms in Korean competition law and policy. As sound economic analysis is critical in dealing with antitrust cases, economic theories must be tested when those come to the courtroom. For a long time, on...