Publications

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January–February 2019
Article

Why Some Platforms Thrive and Others Don't

By: Feng Zhu and Marco Iansiti

In the digital economy, scale is no guarantee of continued success. After all, the same factors that help an online platform expand quickly—such as the low cost of adding new customers—work for challengers too. What, then, allows platforms to fight off rivals and grow... View Details

Keywords: Digital Platforms; Competition; Network Effects; Competitive Strategy

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My year at Harvard Business School as the Newcomen Fellow in Business History was transformative for my research, teaching, and outlook on scholarship for the twenty-first century. The fellowship not only provided me with unparalleled resources, but also gave me a... View Details

04 Dec 2007
Working Paper Summaries

Dynamics of Platform Competition: Exploring the Role of Installed Base, Platform Quality and Consumer Expectations

Keywords: by Feng Zhu & Marco Iansiti; Entertainment & Recreation

2024
Working Paper

“If You’re Not There… You’re Not There”: How Art Market Platforms Induce Status Anxiety to Coerce Participation

By: James Riley and Ezra Zuckerman Sivan

This paper, an 18-month ethnographic investigation of international art fairs (IAFs), shows how market platforms can have a coercive effect, inducing sellers (i.e., art galleries) to participate despite ambivalence over their value and anxiety over the process by which... View Details

Keywords: Market Participation; Status and Position; Competition; Demand and Consumers; Fine Arts Industry

17 Jan 2012
Working Paper Summaries

Expectations, Network Effects and Platform Pricing

Keywords: by Andrei Hagiu & Hanna Hałaburda; Entertainment & Recreation

25 Sep 2006
Research & Ideas

How Software Platforms Revolutionize Business

next ten years? Who will be the winners and losers? A: They will undoubtedly continue to cross industry boundaries and penetrate in a variety of markets previously untouched by digital technologies: For instance, software View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Video Game; Web Services

16 Feb 2012
Working Paper Summaries

Platform Competition Under Partial Belief Advantage

Keywords: by Hanna Halaburda & Yaron Yehezkel; Consumer Products

2009
Working Paper

Strategic Interactions in Two-Sided Market Oligopolies

By: Emmanuel Farhi and Andrei Hagiu

Strategic interactions between two-sided platforms depend not only on whether their decision variables are strategic complements or substitutes as for one-sided firms, but also -and crucially so- on whether or not the platforms subsidize one side of the market in... View Details

Keywords: Two-Sided Markets; Strategic Complements; Strategic Substitutes; Cost; Investment; Profit; One-Sided Platforms; Two-Sided Platforms; Duopoly and Oligopoly; Competitive Advantage

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2007
Working Paper

Dynamics of Platform Competition: Exploring the Role of Installed Base, Platform Quality and Consumer Expectations

By: Feng Zhu and Marco Iansiti

This paper seeks to answer three questions. First, which drives the success of a platform, installed base, platform quality or consumer expectations? Second, when does a monopoly emerge in a platform-based market? Finally, when is a platform-based market socially... View Details

Keywords: Price; Network Effects; Digital Platforms; Monopoly; Quality; Competitive Advantage; Digital Platforms

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Research Summary

Competing on a Common Platform

Why have over 100 firms joined the Eclipse Foundation to collectively produce an open source platform and tools for software application development? What are they trying to accomplish? This research analyzes IBMs divestment of the Eclipse Java Integrated Development... View Details

Research Summary

Dynamics of Platform Competition: Exploring the Role of Installed Base, Platform Quality and Consumer Expectations

Researchers debate the role of installed base, platform quality and consumer expectations in driving the success of platforms. We analyze these three factors in a dynamic model where a new entrant with superior quality competes with an incumbent platform, and... View Details

October 2013 (Revised December 2013)
Case

Intuit QuickBooks: From Product to Platform

By: Andrei Hagiu and Elizabeth J. Altman

This case focuses on the challenges and opportunities faced by a successful incumbent organization attempting to transform a large portion of its business from a traditionally product-centric operating mode to a platform-based one that leverages network effects to... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Digital Platforms; Competitive Advantage; Network Effects; Consumer Products Industry

October 2020 (Revised December 2020)
Case

AfricInvest: A Pan-African Investment Platform

By: Victoria Ivashina and Youssef Abdel Aal

The case is set in December 2018, when Ziad Oueslati, co-managing director and co-founder of AfricInvest, a leading pan-African private equity firm headquartered in Tunisia, was reflecting on the future direction of his firm. AfricInvest started as a traditional small... View Details

Keywords: Finance; Private Equity; Venture Capital; Strategy; Governance; Financial Services Industry; Tunisia; Africa; Middle East

Article

From Netscape to eHarmony: The High Risks and Big Rewards of Platform Markets

By: Dylan B. Minor

Keywords: Leadership; Service Delivery; Mobile Technology; Economics

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October 2014
Module Note

Market Design in Online Businesses (Abridged)

By: Peter Coles and Benjamin Edelman

The purpose of this note is to characterize the challenges entrepreneurs may face in creating a well-functioning ecosystem of users, and to equip entrepreneurs with tools to overcome these obstacles. The note is meant to accompany the final module of the "The Online... View Details

Keywords: Platform Design; Network Effects; Market Design; Information Technology Industry; Information Industry; Advertising Industry

22 Jul 2019
Book

How to Be a Digital Platform Leader

becomes, which lowers the likelihood of a winner-take-all outcome. Lastly, the truly successful firms in a platform world tend to have meaningful supply-side scale economies. Markets with large economies of... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

26 Jan 2019
Working Paper Summaries

Marketplace Scalability and Strategic Use of Platform Investment

Keywords: by Jin Li, Gary P. Pisano, and Feng Zhu

May 2011 (Revised May 2011)
Case

Nokia: The Burning Platform

By: Juan Alcacer, Tarun Khanna and Mary Furey

Overview on the state of Nokia since the “Emerging Nokia?” case was written. View Details

Keywords: Business Strategy; Corporate Strategy; Competitive Advantage; Marketing Strategy; Emerging Markets; Network Effects; Telecommunications Industry; Computer Industry

August 2020 (Revised November 2020)
Case

Gogoro: From Electric Scooter to Energy Platform

By: Tarun Khanna and Billy Chan

The founder of Gogoro had always wanted to revolutionize the energy market from day one since he started the electric scooter business that featured an innovative battery swapping technology. Over the course of five years, he had developed a premium line of electric... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Information Technology; Energy; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Strategy; Taiwan