IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ren/journl/v1y2009i1p80-97.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Optimal Product Proliferation in Monopoly: A Dynamic Analysis

Author

Listed:
  • Luca Lambertini

    (Department of Economics, University of Bologna,Italy)

Abstract

The monopolist's incentives towards product proliferation are evaluated in an optimal control model considering three alternative regimes: profit-seeking; social planning; and a hybrid case with monopoly pricing and a regulator setting product innovation to maximize welfare. In equilibrium, the profit-seeking firm supplies a socially suboptimal number of varieties to reduce cannibalization while the social planner exploits the same effect to satisfy consumersÕ love for variety and decrease the market price of all products. In terms of the Schumpeter vs Arrow debate on the relationship between market structure and innovation incentives, the results obtained in this model have a definite Arrovian flavour.

Suggested Citation

  • Luca Lambertini, 2009. "Optimal Product Proliferation in Monopoly: A Dynamic Analysis," Review of Economic Analysis, Digital Initiatives at the University of Waterloo Library, vol. 1(1), pages 80-97, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:ren:journl:v:1:y:2009:i:1:p:80-97
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.rofea.org/index.php?journal=journal&page=article&op=download&path%5B%5D=30&path%5B%5D=21
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Majerus, David W., 1988. "Price vs. quantity competition in oligopoly supergames," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 293-297.
    2. Giacomo Bonanno, 1987. "Location Choice, Product Proliferation and Entry Deterrence," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 54(1), pages 37-45.
    3. Champsaur, Paul & Rochet, Jean-Charles, 1989. "Multiproduct Duopolists," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 57(3), pages 533-557, May.
    4. Avinash Dixit, 1979. "A Model of Duopoly Suggesting a Theory of Entry Barriers," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 10(1), pages 20-32, Spring.
    5. Brander, James A & Eaton, Jonathan, 1984. "Product Line Rivalry," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(3), pages 323-334, June.
    6. Paul Klemperer, 1995. "Competition when Consumers have Switching Costs: An Overview with Applications to Industrial Organization, Macroeconomics, and International Trade," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 62(4), pages 515-539.
    7. Anderson, Simon P & de Palma, Andre, 1992. "Multiproduct Firms: A Nested Logit Approach," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(3), pages 261-276, September.
    8. Kenneth Arrow, 1962. "Economic Welfare and the Allocation of Resources for Invention," NBER Chapters, in: The Rate and Direction of Inventive Activity: Economic and Social Factors, pages 609-626, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Luca Lambertini, 2003. "The monopolist's optimal R&D portfolio," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 55(4), pages 561-578, October.
    10. Jaskold Gabszewicz, Jean & Shaked, Avner & Sutton, John & Thisse, Jacques-Francois, 1986. "Segmenting the market: The monopolist's optimal product mix," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 39(2), pages 273-289, August.
    11. Paul Klemperer & A. Jorge Padilla, 1997. "Do Firms' Product Lines Include Too Many Varieties?," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 28(3), pages 472-488, Autumn.
    12. Mussa, Michael & Rosen, Sherwin, 1978. "Monopoly and product quality," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 301-317, August.
    13. Klemperer, Paul, 1992. "Equilibrium Product Lines: Competing Head-to-Head May Be Less Competitive," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 82(4), pages 740-755, September.
    14. Panzar, John C., 1989. "Technological determinants of firm and industry structure," Handbook of Industrial Organization, in: R. Schmalensee & R. Willig (ed.), Handbook of Industrial Organization, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 1, pages 3-59, Elsevier.
    15. Wernerfelt, Birger, 1986. "Product Line Rivalry: Note," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 76(4), pages 842-844, September.
    16. Nirvikar Singh & Xavier Vives, 1984. "Price and Quantity Competition in a Differentiated Duopoly," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 15(4), pages 546-554, Winter.
    17. Eric Maskin & John Riley, 1984. "Monopoly with Incomplete Information," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 15(2), pages 171-196, Summer.
    18. Roberto Cellini & Luca Lambertini, 2004. "Private And Social Incentives Towards Investment In Product Differentiation," International Game Theory Review (IGTR), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 6(04), pages 493-508.
    19. Spence, Michael, 1976. "Product Differentiation and Welfare," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 66(2), pages 407-414, May.
    20. MacDonald, Glenn M & Slivinski, Alan, 1987. "The Simple Analytics of Competitive Equilibrium with Multiproduct Firms," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 77(5), pages 941-953, December.
    21. R. Schmalensee & R. Willig (ed.), 1989. "Handbook of Industrial Organization," Handbook of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 2, number 2.
    22. De Fraja, Giovanni, 1994. "A General Characterization of Multiproduct Cournot Competition," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 46(2), pages 171-183, April.
    23. Cellini, Roberto & Lambertini, Luca, 2002. "A differential game approach to investment in product differentiation," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 51-62, November.
    24. R. Schmalensee & R. Willig (ed.), 1989. "Handbook of Industrial Organization," Handbook of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 1, number 1.
    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. Bondarev, Anton & Greiner, Alfred, 2018. "Catching-up and falling behind: Effects of learning in an R&D differential game with spillovers," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 91(C), pages 134-156.
    2. Anton Bondarev, 2016. "Intensity of R&D competition and the generation of innovations in heterogeneous setting," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 26(3), pages 621-653, July.
    3. Bondarev, Anton A., 2012. "Optimal control over a continuous range of homogeneous and heterogeneous innovations with finite life-cycles," MPRA Paper 40068, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Anton Bondarev, 2012. "The long-run dynamics of product and process innovations for a multi-product monopolist," Economics of Innovation and New Technology, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(8), pages 775-799, November.
    5. Amelia Bilbao-Terol & Mar Arenas-Parra & Verónica Cañal-Fernández & Celia Bilbao-Terol, 2016. "Multi-criteria decision making for choosing socially responsible investment within a behavioral portfolio theory framework: a new way of investing into a crisis environment," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 247(2), pages 549-580, December.

    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. S. Baranzoni & P. Bianchi & L. Lambertini, 2000. "Multiproduct Firms, Product Differentiation, and Market Structure," Working Papers 368, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    2. Luca Lambertini, 2003. "The monopolist's optimal R&D portfolio," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 55(4), pages 561-578, October.
    3. Stole, Lars A., 2007. "Price Discrimination and Competition," Handbook of Industrial Organization, in: Mark Armstrong & Robert Porter (ed.), Handbook of Industrial Organization, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 34, pages 2221-2299, Elsevier.
    4. Ping Lin, 2007. "Process R&D and Product Line Deletion by a Multiproduct Monopolist," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 91(3), pages 245-262, July.
    5. Manez, J.A. & Waterson, M., 2001. "Multiproduct Firms and Product Differentiation: a Survey," The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) 594, University of Warwick, Department of Economics.
    6. De Fraja, Giovanni, 1996. "Product line competition in vertically differentiated markets," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 14(3), pages 389-414, May.
    7. Justin P. Johnson & David P. Myatt, 2006. "Multiproduct Cournot oligopoly," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 37(3), pages 583-601, September.
    8. Luca Lambertini, 2007. "Dynamic Spatial Monopoly with Product Development," Spatial Economic Analysis, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 2(2), pages 157-166.
    9. Lambertini, Luca & Mantovani, Andrea, 2009. "Process and product innovation by a multiproduct monopolist: A dynamic approach," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 27(4), pages 508-518, July.
    10. Luca Lambertini & Andrea Mantovani, 2010. "Process and product innovation: A differential game approach to product life cycle," International Journal of Economic Theory, The International Society for Economic Theory, vol. 6(2), pages 227-252, June.
    11. Guido Candela & Roberto Cellini, 2006. "Investment in Tourism Market: A Dynamic Model of Differentiated Oligopoly," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 35(1), pages 41-58, September.
    12. L. Lambertini & R. Orsini, 2014. "Process Innovation and Product Quality Improvement in a Dynamic Monopoly," Working Papers wp926, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    13. Yogesh V. Joshi & David J. Reibstein & Z. John Zhang, 2016. "Turf Wars: Product Line Strategies in Competitive Markets," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 35(1), pages 128-141, January.
    14. Natalia Fabra & Juan-Pablo Montero, 2022. "Product Lines and Price Discrimination in Markets with Information Frictions," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(2), pages 981-1001, February.
    15. Roberto Cellini & Luca Lambertini, 2004. "Private And Social Incentives Towards Investment In Product Differentiation," International Game Theory Review (IGTR), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 6(04), pages 493-508.
    16. Etro, Federico, 2016. "Research in economics and industrial organization," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(4), pages 511-517.
    17. R. Cellini & L. Lambertini, 2000. "Differential Games and Oligopoly Theory: An Overview," Working Papers 369, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    18. Belleflamme,Paul & Peitz,Martin, 2015. "Industrial Organization," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107687899, January.
    19. Justin P. Johnson & David P. Myatt, 2018. "The determinants of product lines," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 49(3), pages 541-573, September.
    20. Alberto Galasso & Mihkel Tombak, 2014. "Switching to Green: The Timing of Socially Responsible Innovation," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 23(3), pages 669-691, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    multiproduct firm; product innovation; optimal control;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L12 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Monopoly; Monopolization Strategies
    • O31 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives

    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:ren:journl:v:1:y:2009:i:1:p:80-97. 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: Dr. Jerzy (Jurek) Konieczny (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.rcfea.org/ .

    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.