This paper analyses how different types of access regulation to next generation networks affect investments and consumer welfare. The model consists of an investment stage with uncertain returns and subsequent quantity competition. The access price is a function of investment costs and the...

This is a set of Frequently Asked Questions (and answers) about the economic, institutional, and technological structure of the Internet. We describe the history and current state of the Internet, discuss some of the pressing economic and regulatory problems, and speculate about future developments.

This paper analyses how different types of access regulation to next generation networks affect investments and consumer welfare. The model consists of an investment stage with uncertain returns and subsequent quantity competition. The access price is a function of investment costs and the...

The introduction of sector-specific regulation in the EU has fostered competition and innovation in the telecommunications industry. However, the liberalisation process still has a long way to go. The debate on the new scenario facing European telecoms regulators shows that as far as the...

Many networks such as the Internet have been found to possess scale-free and small-world network properties reflected by so-called power law distributions. Scale-free properties evolve in large complex networks through self-organizing processes and more specifically, preferential attachment. New...

We consider the impact of a regulatory process forcing an incumbent telecom operator to make its local broadband network available to other companies (local loop unbundling, or LLU). Entrants are then able to upgrade their individual lines and offer Internet services directly to customers....

This paper presents a model of competition between an incumbent and an entrant firm in telecommunications. The entrant has the option to enter the market with or without having preliminary invested in its own infrastructure; in case of facility based entry, the entrant has also the option to...

This paper endogenizes the interplay between innovation by a regulated firm and regulatory delay. When product innovation costs fall over time, an extra day of regulatory delay increases time to introduction by more than a day. In the signaling model, the firm therefore times its innovation to...

While Internet usage blossomed during the entire 1995 – 2001 time period, there was a large change in the nature of the high-speed Internet access business. Initially, connection, routing and content were three separate parts of high-speed Internet service. Cable companies initially teamed...

This paper examines how regulators set local prices in response to the changes brought on by the Telecommunications Act of 1996 (“Telecom Act”). We are particularly interested in the extent to which state regulators set prices that promoted efficiency or were influenced by private-interest...