Managing multiple selling channels in technology driven markets.

摘要

In this dissertation I develop three game theoretic models that capture the interactions between buyers and sellers in B2C, B2B and software markets, when sellers can utilize multiple selling channels, and hence need to understand the relationships between demands on the different channels.; In the first model, presented in Chapter 3, I examine how sellers in B2C markets can use posted prices and online auctions in parallel to sell to heterogeneous consumers. I model consumer choice of channels, and thus market segmentation, and find that consumers who value the item for more than its posted price use a threshold policy to choose between the two channels. I explain how optimizing the design-parameters enables the seller to effectively segment the market so that the two channels reinforce each other and cannibalization is mitigated.; In Chapter 4, I model a B2B spot market with two supplier types: a supplier who faces contracted demand with fixed unit price, and a supplier who works solely on the spot market. I examine when the supplier that has contracts should use the spot market as an additional channel, which supplier type benefits more from the existence of the spot market, and which supplier type has a higher incentive to invest in extending the spot market. I study how the contracted demand affects the production decision and profit of the supplier with no contracts, and I show that the supplier that has contracts and buyer-firms benefit from negative correlation between the demands on the two channels.; In Chapter 5, I develop a conceptual and analytical model of the interaction between a base-software producer, ISVs selling specialized applications that run on the base-software, and user firms, in a horizontally differentiated market. The model captures the tradeoffs user-firms face when choosing between in-house development of business applications and buying packaged applications. I show that as application development cost decreases, the base-software producer prefers having a network of ISVs rather than developing and selling integrated applications.