IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ecl/stabus/1812r2.html

Pricing of Complementary Goods and Network Effects

Author

Listed:
  • Viard, V. Brian

    (Stanford U)

  • Economides, Nicholas

    (New York U)

Abstract

We discuss the case of a monopolist of a base good in the presence of a complementary good provided either by it or by another firm. We assess and calibrate the extent of the influence of the profits from the base good that is created by the existence of complementary good, i.e., the extent of the network effect. We establish an equivalence between a model of a base and a complementary good and a reduced-form model of the base good in which network effects are assumed in the consumers' utility functions as a surrogate for the presence of direct or indirect network effects, such as complementary goods produced by other firms. We also assess and calibrate the influence on profits of the intensity of network effects and quality improvements in both goods. We evaluate the incentive that a monopolist of the base good has to improve its quality rather than that of the complementary good under different market structures. Finally, based on our results, we discuss a possible explanation of the fact that Microsoft Office has a significantly higher price that Microsoft Windows although both products have comparable market shares.

Suggested Citation

  • Viard, V. Brian & Economides, Nicholas, 2006. "Pricing of Complementary Goods and Network Effects," Research Papers 1812r2, Stanford University, Graduate School of Business.
    • Handle: RePEc:ecl:stabus:1812r2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://gsbapps.stanford.edu/researchpapers/library/RP1812(R2).pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Andras Niedermayer, 2006. "Does a Platform Monopolist Want Competition?," Diskussionsschriften dp0604, Universitaet Bern, Departement Volkswirtschaft.
    3. Ewald Scherm & Christian Maaß, 2006. "Zum Stellenwert der Netzwerkökonomik in der Strategie-/Marketingforschung —Eine Analyse empirischer Untersuchungen," Metrika: International Journal for Theoretical and Applied Statistics, Springer, vol. 17(1), pages 27-46, March.
    4. Niedermayer, Andreas, 2015. "Does a Platform Monopolist Want Competition?," Discussion Paper Series of SFB/TR 15 Governance and the Efficiency of Economic Systems 523, Free University of Berlin, Humboldt University of Berlin, University of Bonn, University of Mannheim, University of Munich.
    5. Michel Fok, 2009. "Restructurer efficacement les filières cotonnières en Afrique : les leçons de la déréglementation des réseaux de service en Occident," Post-Print halshs-00476447, HAL.
    6. Andras Niedermayer, 2005. "Does a Platform Owning Monopolist Want Competition?," Diskussionsschriften dp0517, Universitaet Bern, Departement Volkswirtschaft.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • C63 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Mathematical Methods; Programming Models; Mathematical and Simulation Modeling - - - Computational Techniques

    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:ecl:stabus:1812r2. 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.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/gsstaus.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.