Price and quality competition: The effect of differentiation and vertical integration

This paper studies an instance of price and quality competition between firms as seen in the recent Internet market. Consumers purchase a product based on not only its price but also its quality level; therefore, two firms compete in determining their prices and quality levels to maximize their profits. Characterizing this competition from a microeconomic viewpoint, we consider two possible business strategies that firms can utilize to overcome the competition—the differentiation and the vertical integration with another complementary firm. We show an interesting result not seen in the well-known Bertrand price competition: not only does the differentiation always increase the firms’ profits, but also it can increase the consumer’s welfare in a quality-sensitive market. We further derive that under some mild conditions the monopolistic vertical integration that excludes the combination-purchase with a competitor’s product is beneficial for both the integrated firm and its consumers.     

All-pay auctions with pre- and post-bidding options

Motivated by the emergence of online penny or pay-to-bid auctions, in this study, we analyze the operational consequences of all-pay auctions competing with fixed list price stores. In all-pay auctions, bidders place bids, and highest bidder wins. Depending on the auction format, the winner pays either the amount of their bid or that of the second-highest bid. All losing bidders forfeit their bids, regardless of the auction format. Bidders may visit the store, both before and after bidding, and buy the item at the fixed list price. In a modified version, we consider a setting where bidders can use their sunk bid as a credit towards buying the item from the auctioneer at a fixed price (different from the list price). We characterize a symmetric equilibrium in the bidding/buying strategy and derive optimal list prices for both the seller and auctioneer to maximize expected revenue. We consider two situations: (1) one firm operating both channels (i.e. fixed list price store and all-pay auction), and (2) two competing firms, each operating one of the two channels.     

Supply chain performance assessment and supplier and component importance identification in a general competitive multitiered supply chain network model

In this paper, we develop a multitiered competitive supply chain network game theory model, which includes the supplier tier. The firms are differentiated by brands and can produce their own components, as reflected by their capacities, and/or obtain components from one or more suppliers, who also are capacitated. The firms compete in a Cournot–Nash fashion, whereas the suppliers compete a la Bertrand since firms are sensitive to prices. All decision-makers seek to maximize their profits with consumers reflecting their preferences through the demand price functions associated with the demand markets for the firms’ products. We construct supply chain network performance measures for the full supply chain and the individual firm levels that assess the efficiency of the supply chain or firm, respectively, and also allow for the identification and ranking of the importance of suppliers as well as the components of suppliers with respect to the full supply chain or individual firm. The framework is illustrated through a series of numerical supply chain network examples.     

A note on price and quality competition between asymmetric firms

This paper analyzes the impact of asymmetry between firms on the outcome of price and quality competition from a microeconomic viewpoint. Consumers purchase a product based on not only its price but also its quality level; therefore, two firms compete in determining their prices and quality levels to maximize their profits. The asymmetry arises from the difference in consumers’ loyalty to each firm; that asymmetry then determines a character of differentiation between firms. Our purpose is to show how asymmetry influences competition under varying consumers’ price- and quality-sensitivity. In doing so, we extend earlier work in the area of price and quality competition. We show that in both the moderately quality-sensitive and price-sensitive markets, higher consumers’ sensitivity as well as lower consumers’ loyalty to any firm leads to intense competition, resulting in a decrease of both firms’ equilibrium profits. On the other hand, in highly quality-sensitive market, asymmetry compels the smaller firm to change its competitive strategy. In general, this is more beneficial to the larger firm, as the smaller firm’s profit tends to decline. In the worst case, the smaller firm is driven out of business under equilibrium.     

An auction model arising from an Internet search service provider

Most search service providers such as Lycos and Google either produce irrelevant search results or unstructured company listings to the consumers. To overcome these two shortcomings, search service providers such as GoTo.com have developed mechanisms for firms to advertise their services and for consumers to search for the right services. To provide relevant search results, each firm who wishes to advertise at the GoTo site must specify a set of keywords. To develop structured company listings, each firm bids for priority listing in the search results that appear on the GoTo site. Since the search results appear in descending order of bid price, each firm has some control over the order in which the firm appears on the list resulting from the search. In this paper, we present a one-stage game for two firms that captures the advertising mechanism of a search service provider (such as GoTo). This model enables us to examine the firm’s optimal bidding strategy and evaluate the impact of various parameters on the firm’s strategy. Moreover, we analyze the conditions under which all firms would increase their bids at the equilibrium. These conditions could be helpful to the service provider when developing mechanisms to entice firms to submit higher bids.     

On the cooperation of recycling operations

This paper addresses two important issues that may affect the operations efficiency in the recycling industry. First, the industry contains many small-scale and inefficient recycling firms, especially in developing countries. Second, the output from recycling a waste product often yields multiple recycled products that cannot all be sold efficiently by a single firm. To address these two issues, this paper examines how different firms can cooperate in their recycling and pricing decisions using cooperative game theory. Recycling operations under both joint and individual productions with different cost structures are considered. Decisions include the quantity of waste product to recycle and the price at which to sell each recycled product on each firm’s market. These decisions can be made jointly by multiple cooperating firms to maximize total profit. We design allocation schemes for maximized total profit to encourage cooperation among all firms. Managerial insights are provided from both environmental and economic perspectives.     

On the value of information sharing and cooperative price setting

We consider a setting of two firms that sell substitutable products under price competition. We show that private signals enable firms to improve market forecast and earn higher profits. Provided that their private signals are not perfectly correlated, firms can benefit from sharing signals with each other. This is irrespective of product substitutability. Moreover, information sharing is a strategic complement to cooperative price setting to improve the profit performance of firms.     

医药产学研联盟创新决策、创新危机与利润分配

以我国医药行业产学研合作创新为现实背景,构建两家相互竞争的制药企业与学研机构的双边纳什议价模型,分析企业的创新价值和议价能力对联盟成员绩效的影响,探讨合作创新对药品价格、企业市场份额、经营绩效和社会福利的影响,研究制药企业创新战略的选择决策及创新对企业可能的危险。通过模型分析,得到如下结论:产学研合作创新能够提高社会总福利,但不一定提高制药企业的绩效和药品的价格;议价能力强的制药企业不一定总是获得高利润,企业最终的利润受到企业自身及竞争者的议价能力、创新价值的共同影响;虽然产品创新能够提高消费者的购买意愿,但盲目跟风创新可能会带来双输的结果。本研究对促进医药行业的产学研合作,提高产学研合作的有效性具有现实意义。     

考虑消费者从众特性的动态定价研究

面对掌握大量信息的消费者,厂商需考虑多方因素制定价格策略。研究运用经典的博弈模型,讨论不同消费者特性情况下厂商的定价机制。模型按从众特性和等待特性将消费者分为六类,并引入一个价格偏差变量,分析各类型消费者比例变化对厂商定价和利润的影响。结果显示,一般情况下降价幅度、消费者期望购买总数量和期望销售利润都随着反从众消费者比例的增大而增加。最后扩展分析了效益贴现率,反从众消费者比例和短视型消费者比例三因素对厂商总利润的影响,研究认为效益贴现率和从众消费者比例较高时,厂商利润会随着短视型消费者比例的降低而有所提高。因此,为使收益最大化,厂商在制定定价策略时需同时考虑贴现因素和消费者行为特性。     

Impact of product pricing and timing of investment decisions on supply chain co-opetition

In supply chain co-opetition, firms simultaneously compete and co-operate in order to maximize their profits. We consider the nature of co-opetition between two firms: The product supplier invests in the technology to improve quality, and the purchasing firm (buyer) invests in selling effort to develop the market for the product before uncertainty in demand is resolved. We consider three different decision making structures and discuss the optimal configuration from each firm’s perspective. In case 1, the supplier invests in product quality and sets the wholesale price for the product. The buyer then exerts selling effort to develop the market and following demand potential realization, sets the resale price. In case 2, the supplier invests in product quality followed by the buyer’s investment in selling effort. Then, after demand potential is observed, the supplier sets the wholesale price and the buyer sets the resale price. Finally, in case 3, both firms simultaneously invest in product quality and selling effort, respectively. Subsequently, observing the demand potential, the supplier sets the wholesale price and the buyer sets the resale price. We compare all configuration options from both the perspective of the supplier and the buyer, and show that the level of investment by the firms depends on the nature of competition between them and the level of uncertainty in demand. Our analysis reveals that although configuration 1 results in the highest profits for the integrated channel, there is no clear dominating preference on system configuration from the perspective of both parties. The incentives of the co-opetition partners and the investment levels are mainly governed by the cost structure and the level of uncertainty in demand. We examine and discuss the relation between system parameters and the incentives in desiging the supply contract structure.     

Approximating Nash equilibrium for production control with sticky price

We study a mean field game problem arising from the production control for multiple firms with price stickiness in the commodity market. The price dynamics for each firm is described as a (controlled) jump-diffusion process with mean-field interaction. Each firm aims to maximize her expectation of cumulative net profit coupled with each other through price processes. By solving the limiting control problem and a fixed-point problem, we construct an explicit approximating Nash equilibrium when the number of firms grows large.     

Pricing policies for substitutable products in a supply chain with Internet and traditional channels

This study considers pricing policies in a supply chain with one manufacturer, who sells a product to an independent retailer and directly to consumers through an Internet channel. In addition to the manufacturer’s product, the retailer sells a substitute product produced by another manufacturer. Given the wholesale prices of the two substitute products, the manufacturer decides the retail price of the Internet channel, and the retailer decides the retail prices of the two substitute products. Both the manufacturer and the retailer choose their own decision variables to maximize their respective profits. This work formulates the price competition, using the settings of Nash and Stackelberg games, and derives the corresponding existence and uniqueness conditions for equilibrium solutions. A sensitivity analysis of an equilibrium solution is then conducted for the model parameters, and the profits are compared for two game settings. The findings show that improving brand loyalty is profitable for both of the manufacturer and retailer, and that an increased service value may alleviate the threat of the Internet channel for the retailer and increase the manufacturer’s profit. The study also derives some conditions under which the manufacturer and the retailer mutually prefer the Stackelberg game. Based on these results, this study proposes an appropriate cooperation strategy for the manufacturer and retailer.     

三级供应链企业间交叉持股时均衡定价及市场绩效研究

本文构建三级供应链企业间纵向交叉持股时的Stackelberg定价博弈模型,采用逆推归纳法推演出供应链各厂商交叉持股时的均衡定价及其利润公式,分析了交叉持股对三级供应链均衡市场价格、厂商利润、消费者剩余和经济福利的影响。研究结果表明,较之无交叉持股,仅下游厂商对上游厂商单向持股,对供应链的绩效没有影响;而适当增大上游厂商对下游厂商持股,限制下游厂商对上游厂商持股,能有效降低市场价格,提高供应链及各厂商的利润,增加消费者剩余,改善经济福利,实现供应链各厂商与消费者的共赢。     

Manufacturer incentives to improve retail service levels

In this paper we provide a solution to the problem of how a manufacturer can provide an incentive to a separately-owned retailer to raise its service level above the level it would choose on its own. We analyze the effects the manufacturer's incentive has on the individual profits of the retailer and manufacturer, as well as their joint profits. Our work is an application of game theory in which we tackle the problem posed by separate ownership of the two firms and the resulting conflict over the gains from cooperation. We utilize a plausible model of service-sensitive demand, one which is relatively free of ad hoc assumptions. Our approach has the strength that it proposes a credible solution to the problem of manufacturer-retailer cooperation when profits are sensitive to retail service levels. Our results indicate that the optimal level of incentive for the manufacturer and the resulting shares of the manufacturer and retailer in increased profits are particularly sensitive to the underlying variability of demand and to the relative variability of additional demand induced by higher service levels.     

Inducing efficiency in oligopolistic markets with increasing returns to scale

We consider a Cournot oligopoly market of firms possessing increasing returns to scale technologies (which may not be identical). It is shown that an external regulating agency can increase total social welfare without running a deficit by offering to subsidize one firm an amount which depends on the output level of that firm and the market price. The firms bid for this contract, the regulator collects the highest bid upfront and subsidizes the highest bidding firm. It is shown that there exists a subsidy schedule such that (i) the regulator breaks even, (ii) the subsidized firm obtains zero net profit and charges a price equal to its average cost, (iii) every other firm willingly exit the market and (iv) market price decreases, consumers are better off and total welfare improves.     

Equilibrium two-part cost structures

We consider an oligopolistic product market in which two competing firms instead of paying a competitive input price choose a two-part tariff. Costs for the input are divided up into upfront fixed costs independent of the output level and reductions in marginal costs. We explore under which competitive settings will such a two-part cost structure correspond to equilibrium behavior in a two stage game. We find that firms in a static model do have an incentive to choose a two-part cost structure when competition in the product market is not too strong and oligopoly rents can be shifted form the rival to the own firm. In a dynamic market when firms use Markov strategies competition is so intense that there are no rents to be shifted and firms do not benefit from two-part cost structures.     

Price and QoS competition in data communication services

Pricing of data communication services has been studied, but primarily in a monopolistic setting. We study the price competition in packet-switching networks with a quality-of-service (QoS) guarantee in terms of an expected per-packet delay. We propose a general framework in which service providers offering multi-class priority-based services compete to maximize their profits, while satisfying the expected delay guarantee in each class. We first examine the price competition with fixed delay guarantees and then extend it to the situation where providers compete in quality of service as well as price. In each case, we compare the duopoly pricing scheme with the case when two service providers merge to become a monopoly provider.     

Dynamic strategic interaction between an innovating and a non-innovating incumbent

This paper analyzes the effects of product innovation on the firms’ investment behavior in a dynamic duopoly framework. A differential game setting is considered where initially two firms are active on a homogeneous product market. One of the firms has an option to introduce a new product that is horizontally and vertically differentiated from the established product. The resulting differential game has three states corresponding to three capital stocks: one for each firm to produce the established product, and one for the innovating firm to produce the new product. We numerically derive Markov perfect equilibria. One of the most remarkable results is that in most cases the non-innovating firm benefits when the other firm carries out the innovation option. The intuition is that, to increase demand for the innovative product, the innovative firm reduces capacity on the established market, which increases the price of the established product and thus the payoff of the non-innovating firm.     

基于网络顾客行为意向的物流服务供应链定价策略

就一个运营网络购物的供应链,分析物流服务需求方和服务提供方的定价和服务水平决策等问题。在成本共担优化模型中考虑基于顾客购买行为意向的产品需求函数,进而分别给出非合作、准合作和完全合作模式下供应链企业决策间的关系,以及网购顾客重购概率对最优定价策略的影响。结论有:证明三种合作模式下双方最优策略的存在性及存在条件;给出最优产品定价策略和服务定价策略间的数量关系,并证明其与网购顾客行为意向有关。数值分析表明,最优定价策略随服务水平和网购顾客重购概率的变化趋势受成本共担系数的影响;较小的成本分摊系数使最优产品定价随着服务水平和网购顾客重购概率的变化幅度增大。     

Duopoly competition in networks

This paper presents a new approach to modeling competition between firms in network-based industries, i.e. industries where the firms' technology decisions correspond to choices of networks. Industries having this structure include transportation, telecommunications, and some service industries. Competition is studied between two firms who make both network design decisions and price decisions for services. This situation is modeled as a game, an equilibrium solution corresponding to a Nash equilibrium is defined, and properties of the solution are characterized. Necessary and sufficient conditions are shown for equilibrium solutions and existence of equilibrium solutions is demonstrated. Among the results is that each firm will maximize its own profit by minimizing total industry cost of providing services. An example demonstrating results is presented.