We study a setting where the opportunism or commitment problem identifed by Hart and Tirole (1990) may arise. An upstream monopolist may sell its product to two differentiated downstream retailers. Contract unobservability induces the manufacturer and each retailer to free-ride on margins earned...

In this paper we investigate some of the most frequent arguments for the use of slotting allowances. It has been claimed that slotting allowances can be profitability used to increase retail profits at the cost of increasing consumer prices. A second argument is that slotting allowances can be...

We review the recent literature on mobile termination rates (MTR) in mobile communication networks (M2M). This literature shows that mobile networks may have incentives to charge ineficient high termination charges leading to reduced surplus for consumers and society, and therefore should be...

The article examines how the existence of a retailer owned brand, private label, aspects the price setting of a national brand. We …nd that the potential for a private label introduction may lead to price concessions from the national brand producer, but that actual private label...

Suppliers and consumer organizations have become increasingly concerned by the build-up of buyer power of retailers in many markets. A major concern is that strong retailers will abuse their power to exclude products and rival retailers from the market to be able to increase prices to consumers....

The article offers a complementary theory for conglomerate mergers. The central argument is that a conglomerate merger may be a vertical merger in disguise. The acquisition of a non-competing firm takes place to achieve control over the target's distribution channel that otherwise could be used...

In a setting with two differentiated producers and identical retailers, we analyzed whether the producers will have a distribution system with one or several retailers. In contrast to the existing literature, we allow for full foreclosure under both types of distribution systems. We find, in...

Received literature have shown that if competing networks are restricted to linear and uniform pricing, high access charges can facilitate collusion; a result that breaks down if we allow for non-linear and discriminatory pricing, however. We show that by adding unbalanced calling pattern to the...