This article examines a model of competition between two types of health insurer: Health Maintenance Organizations (HMOs) and nonintegrated insurers. HMOs vertically integrate health care providers and pay them at a competitive price, while nonintegrated health insurers work as indemnity plans...

Economic theory provides various explanations for vertical integration but transaction costs seem to be a major determinant of backward, forward and lateral integration. The paper studies integration trends in the newly emerging Bulgarian pharmaceutical sector, seeking transaction cost...

This paper provides an economic analysis of recent vertical and horizontal mergers in the U.S. industry for audiovisual media content, including the AT&T-Time Warner and the Disney-Fox mergers. Using a theory-driven approach, we examine economic effects of these types of mergers on market...

Our article investigates the impact of vertical integration (without foreclosure) on innovation. We compare cases where either (i) two manufacturers or (ii) a manufacturer and a vertically integrated retailer invest. Then, the independent manufacturer(s) and the retailer bargain over non-linear...

This study constructs a successive Cournot model to investigate the possibility that a separated upstream input supplier can solely sell the intermediate good to a separated downstream manufacturer through an exclusive contract in the presence of a vertically integrated rival. We find that the...

Due to potential abuse of the market power at wholesale and retail market level for natural gas the Federal Cartel Office in Germany prohibited further forward integration of gas importing firms with retail incumbents from 2005/2006 to 2010. The Authority argued that the very few dominant gas...

This article presents a link between tariff rates and industry structure in a dynamic setting. We examine the role of tariffs on final-goods in a firm's decision to integrate and collude in the presence of competitive imports. It is shown that, under some conditions, the upstream firm has an...

In the beginning of fixed network liberalisation in Europe in the late 1990s, the main concern of regulators was to lower calls prices. This was done by introducing wholesale regulation and promoting service based competition. Some years later, the concern of some regulators turned from too high...

In dem Paper wird untersucht, wann ein vertikal integrierter Netzbetreiber einen Anreiz hat, durch Fordern hoher Netznutzungsentgelte Wettbewerber vom Strommarkt fernzuhalten (Preisstrukturmißbrauch). Es wird als kontraintuitives Ergebnis abgeleitet, daß ein Kostennachteil des Netzbetreibers...

This paper explores the relation between the regulation of monopolistic upstream prices and the incentives of a vertically integrated input monopolist to discriminate third parties on the downstream market. Currently, this is an issue in network industries like telecommunications, electricity...