Consider a market with switching costs that is initially served by a monopolistic incumbent. How can a competitor successfully enter this market? We show that an offer to undercut the incumbent by a fixed margin serves this purpose. This strategy dominates traditional entry where the entrant...

This paper sheds light on the political economy of local energy politics both from a theoretical and an empirical perspective. A case study of a small town in Southern Germany (Schönau) is presented, where environmentalists have won the political contest against the regional energy monopolist...