Network operators of competing infrastructures in European electronic communications markets face asymmetric regulation: incumbent telecommunications firms are required to open their networks for retail broadband competition, while cable companies have no such obligation. Furthermore, for...

We examine the interrelation between interconnection and competition in the Internet backbone market. Networks that are asymmetric in size choose among different interconnection regimes and compete for end-users. We show that a direct interconnection regime, peering, softens competition as...

Firms that wish to offer wireline, multichannel video programming services in direct competition with cable incumbents are being faced with calls by those incumbents and policymakers to "build-out" to entire communities as a pre-condition of receiving a franchise. This "build-out" requirement is...

This POLICY PAPER presents an economic model showing how incumbent local exchange carriers may deter efficient facilities-based entry for high capacity loop facilities through the use of quantity-discount contracts for Special Access services. Since efficient entry is deterred, these contracts...

This Policy Bulletin examines the Federal Communications Commission's decision to remove "new" Bell Operating Company fiber and "hybrid-fiber" facilities from the unbundling requirements of the 1996 Telecommunications Act as part of its Triennial Review. This Policy Bulletin demonstrates that...

Fifty years ago, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter warned the Federal Communications Commission not to view competition in an abstract, sterile way. To illustrate the dangers of using such an abstract approach to the key issue of ILEC market power, this paper uses the Commission's...

We examine the interrelation between interconnection and competition in the Internet backbone market. Networks that are asymmetric in size choose among different interconnection regimes and compete for end-users. We show that a direct interconnection regime, peering, softens competition as...

The Telecommunications Act of 1996 (the "1996 Act"), by stressing the reduction or elimination of entry barriers that prevent the fragmentation of market structure and an increase in the number of competitors, established competition and deregulation as the foundation for public policy towards...