Understanding the implications of digital platform strategies on user welfare has become a crucial issue for policy makers and economists alike. In payments, distributed ledger technologies such as the blockchain have introduced new models of platform governance in the form of vertically...

We consider a software vendor first selling a monopoly platform and then an application running on this platform. He may face competition by an entrant in the applications market. The platform monopolist can benefit from competition for three reasons. First, his profits from the platform...