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David Gabel and David F. Weiman The chapters in this volwne address the related problems of regulating and pricing access in network industries. Interconnection between network suppliers raises the important policy questions of how to sustain competition and realize economic efficiency. To foster rivalry in any industry, suppliers must have access to customers. But unlike in other sectors, the very organization of network industries creates major impediments to potential entrants trying to carve out a niche in the market. In traditional sectors such as gas, electric, rail, and telephone services, these barriers take the form of the large private and social costs necessary to duplicate the physical infrastructure of pipelines, wires, or tracks. Few firms can afford to finance such an undertaking, because the level of sunk costs and the very large scale economies make it extremely risky. In other newer sectors, entrants face less tangible but no less pressing constraints. In the microcomputer industry, for example, high switching costs can prevent users from experimenting with alternative, but perhaps more efficient hardware platforms or operating systems. Although gateway technologies can reduce these barriers, the installed base of an incumbent can create powerful bandwagon effects that reinforce its advantage (such as the greater availability of compatible peripherals and software applications). In the era of electronic banking, entrants into the automated teller machine· (A TM) and credit card markets face a similar problem of establishing a ubiquitous presence.
"The question which this report addresses is how the Commission should seek to ensure the success of initiatives taken with a view to liberalising the network industries. In other words, the key question is not 'how should a regulatory authority establish network access prices within the framework of its own particular objectives and institutional arrangements?' but 'within the framework of European competition law, how should the Commission take a view as to whether a particular set of network access prices is anti-competitive?'"--Introduction.
Traditionally engineers devised communication services without reference to how they should be priced. In today's environment pricing is a very complex subject and in practice depends on many parameters of the actual market - including amount of traffic, architecture of the network, technology, and cost. The challenge is to provide a generic service model which accurately captures aspects such as quality and performance, and can be used to derive optimal pricing strategies. Recent technology advances, combined with the deregulation of the telecommunication market and the proliferation of the internet, have created a highly competitive environment for communication service prividers. Pricing is no longer as simple as picking an appropriate model for a particular contract. There is a real need for a book that explains the provision of new services, the relation between pricing and resource allocation in networks; and the emergence of the internet and how to price it. Pricing Communication Networks provides a framework of mathematical models for pricing these multidimensional contracts, and includes background in network services and contracts, network techonology, basic economics, and pricing strategy. It can be used by economists to fill in the gaps in their knowledge of network services and technology, and for engineers and operational researchers to gain the background in economics required to price communication services effectively. * Provides a broad overview of network services and contracts * Includes a primer on modern network technology and the economic concepts relevant to pricing and competition * Includes discussion of mathematical models of traffic flow to help describe network capability and derive pricing strategies * Includes coverage of specialist topics, such as regulation, multicasting, and auctions * Illustrated throughout by detailed real examples * Suitable for anyone with an understanding of basic calculus and probability Primarily aimed at graduate students, researchers and practitioners from electrical engineering, computer science, economics and operations research Pricing Communication Networks will also appeal to telecomms engineers working in industry.
We develop a framework, extending the conventional duopoly model by replacing the Hotelling line with a simplex in high-dimension spaces, to study the competition and access regulation of multiple networks. We first characterize the competitive equilibrium when the substitutabilities of the networks are not too high, or the access charges are nearly cost-based. We then analyze how the equilibrium market shares respond to marginal variations in the access charges under various regimes of access regulation, and thereby examine the efficiency implications of such regulation regimes. In particular, we analyze the asymmetric scenario in which some networks are incumbent and some are entrants. It is shown that some existing results of the duopoly do not extend to a multi-firm setting, largely because regulation of multiple networks is structurally far richer.
This report addresses the regulation of access to telecommunication networks. Development of competition and the success of liberalisation often depend on the access terms and conditions chosen, and public policy interest in getting these terms and conditions right is important.
We compare various access pricing rules in the two-way access model. We show that the Generalized Efficient-Component Pricing Rule (GECPR) leads to a lower equilibrium price than does the Efficient Component-Pricing Rule, Marginal Cost Pricing, or any non-negative fixed access charges.
A new class of access pricing problems is analyzed in which upstream firms compete for customers and access to these customers is required by downstream markets. Using fixed-to-cellular calls as an example, a model is presented which shows that the determination of cellular termination charges is quite different to standard access pricing problems. Competition between cellular firms leads to access prices being set either at, or above, the monopoly level. Applications are given for other market settings, including the termination of long-distance calls on competing local exchange networks and the setting of interchange fees in payment systems.
This paper presents a model of two competing local telecommunications networks which are mandated to interconnect. After negotiating the access charges, the companies engage in price competition. Given the prices, each consumer selects a network and determines the consumption of phone calls. Using a discrete/continuous consumer choice model, it is shown that a pure strategy equilibrium exists quite generally and satisfies desirable properties. This equilibrium can be implemented by a simple rule that sets the access charges at a common discount from the retail prices. It requires no information and the discount factor is chosen by the companies through negotiations. Finally, if the networks are highly substitute, the retail prices obtained by imposing this rule will approximate the efficient prices.