IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/econom/v81y2014i324p768-787.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Horizontal Product Differentiation in Auctions and Multilateral Negotiations

Author

Listed:
  • Charles J. Thomas
  • Bart J. Wilson

Abstract

type="main" xml:id="ecca12090-abs-0001"> We experimentally compare first-price auctions and multilateral negotiations after introducing horizontal product differentiation into a standard procurement setting. Both institutions yield identical surplus for the buyer, a difference from prior findings with homogeneous products that results from differentiation's influence on sellers' pricing behaviour. The data are consistent with this finding being driven by concessions from low-cost sellers in response to differentiation reducing their likelihood of being the buyer's surplus-maximizing trading partner. Further analysis shows that introducing product differentiation increases the intensity of price competition among sellers, which contrasts with the conventional wisdom that product differentiation softens competition.

Suggested Citation

  • Charles J. Thomas & Bart J. Wilson, 2014. "Horizontal Product Differentiation in Auctions and Multilateral Negotiations," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 81(324), pages 768-787, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:econom:v:81:y:2014:i:324:p:768-787
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1111/ecca.2014.81.issue-324
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Waehrer, Keith & Perry, Martin K, 2003. "The Effects of Mergers in Open-Auction Markets," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 34(2), pages 287-304, Summer.
    2. Yeon-Koo Che, 1993. "Design Competition through Multidimensional Auctions," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 24(4), pages 668-680, Winter.
    3. Catherine D. Wolfram, 1998. "Strategic Bidding in a Multiunit Auction: An Empirical Analysis of Bids to Supply Electricity in England and Wales," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 29(4), pages 703-725, Winter.
    4. Milgrom, Paul R & Weber, Robert J, 1982. "A Theory of Auctions and Competitive Bidding," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(5), pages 1089-1122, September.
    5. Drew Fudenberg & Jean Tirole, 1983. "Sequential Bargaining with Incomplete Information," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 50(2), pages 221-247.
    6. McAfee, R Preston & McMillan, John, 1987. "Auctions and Bidding," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 25(2), pages 699-738, June.
    7. Charles J. Thomas & Bart J. Wilson, 2005. "Verifiable Offers and the Relationship Between Auctions and Multilateral Negotiations," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 115(506), pages 1016-1031, October.
    8. Charles J. Thomas & Bart J. Wilson, 2002. "A Comparison of Auctions and Multilateral Negotiations," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 33(1), pages 140-155, Spring.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Nicola Doni & Domenico Menicucci, 2014. "Information Revelation in Procurement Auctions with Two‐Sided Asymmetric Information," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 23(4), pages 952-968, December.
    2. Thomas, Charles J., 2018. "An alternating-offers model of multilateral negotiations," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 149(C), pages 269-293.
    3. Gregory E. Kersten & Tomasz Wachowicz & Margaret Kersten, 2016. "Competition, Transparency, and Reciprocity: A Comparative Study of Auctions and Negotiations," Group Decision and Negotiation, Springer, vol. 25(4), pages 693-722, July.
    4. Burns, Nathaniel A. & Deck, Cary A. & Thomas, Charles J., 2023. "Experimental analysis of impatience in bilateral and multilateral negotiations," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 95(C).
    5. Charles J. Thomas, 2014. "How the Nature of Product Differentiation Affects Procurement Competition," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 81(2), pages 323-344, October.
    6. Charles J. Thomas, 2019. "A New Perspective on Entry in Horizontal Merger Analysis," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 55(3), pages 459-491, November.
    7. Li, Sherry Xin & Dogan, Kutsal & Haruvy, Ernan, 2011. "Group identity in markets," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 104-115, January.
    8. Domenico Colucci & Nicola Doni & Vincenzo Valori, 2015. "Information policies in procurement auctions with heterogeneous suppliers," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 114(3), pages 211-238, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Gregory E. Kersten & Tomasz Wachowicz & Margaret Kersten, 2016. "Competition, Transparency, and Reciprocity: A Comparative Study of Auctions and Negotiations," Group Decision and Negotiation, Springer, vol. 25(4), pages 693-722, July.
    2. Esther Gal-Or & Mordechai Gal-Or & Anthony Dukes, 2007. "Optimal information revelation in procurement schemes," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 38(2), pages 400-418, June.
    3. Charles J. Thomas, 2021. "Profitable Horizontal Mergers Without Efficiencies Can Increase Consumer Surplus," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 69(3), pages 730-741, September.
    4. Roberto Burguet, 2000. "Auction theory: a guided tour," Investigaciones Economicas, Fundación SEPI, vol. 24(1), pages 3-50, January.
    5. Sexton, Richard J., 1994. "A Survey of Noncooperative Game Theory with Reference to Agricultural Markets: Part 2. Potential Applications in Agriculture," Review of Marketing and Agricultural Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 62(02), pages 1-18, August.
    6. Thomas, Charles J., 2018. "An alternating-offers model of multilateral negotiations," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 149(C), pages 269-293.
    7. Perrone, G. & Roma, P. & Lo Nigro, G., 2010. "Designing multi-attribute auctions for engineering services procurement in new product development in the automotive context," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 124(1), pages 20-31, March.
    8. Stéphane Saussier & Carine Staropoli & Anne Yvrande-Billon, 2009. "Public–Private Agreements, Institutions, and Competition: When Economic Theory Meets Facts," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 35(1), pages 1-18, September.
    9. Martin Bichler & Alexander Pikovsky & Thomas Setzer, 2009. "An Analysis of Design Problems in Combinatorial Procurement Auctions," Business & Information Systems Engineering: The International Journal of WIRTSCHAFTSINFORMATIK, Springer;Gesellschaft für Informatik e.V. (GI), vol. 1(1), pages 111-117, February.
    10. Edieal J. Pinker & Abraham Seidmann & Yaniv Vakrat, 2003. "Managing Online Auctions: Current Business and Research Issues," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 49(11), pages 1457-1484, November.
    11. Yeon-Koo Che & Ian Gale, 1994. "Auctions with budget-constrained buyers: a nonequivalence result," Working Papers (Old Series) 9402, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.
    12. Thomas D. Jeitschko, 1998. "Learning in Sequential Auctions," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 65(1), pages 98-112, July.
    13. Jinpeng Ma, 1997. "English Auctions and Walrasian Equilibria with Multiple Objects: a dynamic approach," Departmental Working Papers 199702, Rutgers University, Department of Economics.
    14. Lamy, Laurent, 2012. "The econometrics of auctions with asymmetric anonymous bidders," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 167(1), pages 113-132.
    15. Walter Beckert, 2004. "Dynamic Monopolies with Stochastic Demand," Birkbeck Working Papers in Economics and Finance 0404, Birkbeck, Department of Economics, Mathematics & Statistics.
    16. David C. Parkes & Jayant Kalagnanam, 2005. "Models for Iterative Multiattribute Procurement Auctions," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 51(3), pages 435-451, March.
    17. Brosig, Jeannette & Heinrich, Timo, 2011. "Reputation and Mechanism Choice in Procurement Auctions – An Experiment," Ruhr Economic Papers 254, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    18. Zhang, Meng & Kong, Zhaojun, 2022. "A multi-attribute double auction and bargaining model for emergency material procurement," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 254(C).
    19. Tarcisio Barroso da Graca, 2001. "Ganhadores dos Leilões da Privatização Brasileira Realmente Ganham: Evidência Empírica de Um Estudo de Evento," Anais do XXIX Encontro Nacional de Economia [Proceedings of the 29th Brazilian Economics Meeting] 064, ANPEC - Associação Nacional dos Centros de Pós-Graduação em Economia [Brazilian Association of Graduate Programs in Economics].
    20. Brasil, Eric Universo Rodrigues & Postali, Fernando Antonio Slaibe, 2014. "Informational rents in oil and gas concession auctions in Brazil," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 93-101.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:econom:v:81:y:2014:i:324:p:768-787. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/lsepsuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.