Evaluating market consolidation in mobile communications

We study the dual relationship between market structure and prices and between market structure and investment in mobile telecommunications. Using a uniquely constructed panel of mobile operators' prices and accounting information across 33 OECD countries between 2002 and 2014, we document that more concentrated markets lead to higher end user prices. Furthermore, they also lead to higher investment per mobile operator, though the impact on total investment is not conclusive. Our findings are not only relevant for the current consolidation wave in the telecommunications industry. More generally, they stress that competition and regulatory authorities should take seriously the potential trade-off between market power effects and efficiency gains stemming from agreements between firms

Priming the Pump: The Case for a Sector Based Approach to Impact Investing

The impact investing sector, while still in its infancy, has made remarkable progress in building awareness that business can generate a positive social impact. Although individual firms remain the essential innovators and building blocks of social change, they are means to a broader end of creating innovations that can touch the lives of hundreds of millions. It is time now to evolve the conversation, and our resource commitments in the direction of sparking, nurturing, and scaling these new industry sectors that are the true promise of the impact investing industry. What is readily apparent according to this report is that no one organization, or one type of organization, can do this alone. Success does not depend upon perfect coordination or a grand plan. After all, we are talking about innovation, which requires experimentation, learning, and serendipity. But success does require a determined, thoughtful, and frequently collaborative effort by those who believe that the power of markets and the inspiration of entrepreneurs can be tapped to create opportunity and a brighter future for billions

Measuring internationalisation in the mobile telecommunications industry

The telecommunications industry is often described as being a global industry. However, the fact that it exists throughout the globe does not necessarily imply that its constituent companies are individually global in their operations. So far, little interest has been expressed in determining whether they are or are not in practice, but to do so requires that one first determine how this is to be measured. This article focuses on the measurement of internationalisation within the mobile telecommunications industry where the phenomenon can be most clearly identified. Drawing on the literature, four dimensions of internationalisation are initially identified and a database is constructed for the year ending 31 December 2005 that provides hard evidence in relation to these dimensions. Analysis of the results reveals that just a handful of the companies in the sample can be considered to be meaningfully international when all four criteria are taken into account, and that Vodafone among them is best placed to describe itself as a global mobile operator although there are too many reservations for the term global to be seen as an appropriate label. The results highlight the complexity of internationalisation, with operators tending to do well on some of the criteria but not on others, and the paper illustrates how data availability influences the choice of criteria. Data availability also necessitates a trade-off between sample comprehensiveness and detail

The Industry and Policy Context for Digital Games for Empowerment and Inclusion:Market Analysis, Future Prospects and Key Challenges in Videogames, Serious Games and Gamification

The effective use of digital games for empowerment and social inclusion (DGEI) of people and communities at risk of exclusion will be shaped by, and may influence the development of a range of sectors that supply products, services, technology and research. The principal industries that would appear to be implicated are the 'videogames' industry, and an emerging 'serious games' industry. The videogames industry is an ecosystem of developers, publishers and other service providers drawn from the interactive media, software and broader ICT industry that services the mainstream leisure market in games, The 'serious games' industry is a rather fragmented and growing network of firms, users, research and policy makers from a variety of sectors. This emerging industry is are trying to develop knowledge, products, services and a market for the use of digital games, and products inspired by digital games, for a range of non-leisure applications. This report provides a summary of the state of play of these industries, their trajectories and the challenges they face. It also analyses the contribution they could make to exploiting digital games for empowerment and social inclusion. Finally, it explores existing policy towards activities in these industries and markets, and draws conclusions as to the future policy relevance of engaging with them to support innovation and uptake of effective digital game-based approaches to empowerment and social inclusion.JRC.J.3-Information Societ

Change within the Mobile Communications Market - an initial assessment of the structural and organisational repercussions of 3G

Over the last year or so the mobile telecommunications industry has undergone a complete sea change; the initial euphoria surrounding the German and UK licensing process, where widely optimistic claims about the array of possible services and uptake were made, has been replaced by widespread anxiety and pessimism. This anxiety and pessimism is driven by the large debts that companies have incurred to enter the market, doubts as to the validity of claims that 3G will usher in a whole new era of service development and the increasing belief that subscribers will not migrate in the required numbers to the new technology. The organisational and market repercussions of 3G are addressed in the following main section that is divided into three parts. In the first part infrastructure sharing between 3G license winners is dealt with, whilst in the second mergers and acquisition activity is examined. The third part focuses on the organisational form of 3G license winners and network scale. Conclusions are then drawn in the final main section

The gains from preferential tax regimes reconsidered

The EU policy against harmful tax competition aims at eliminating tax policies targeted at attracting the internationally mobile tax base. We construct an imperfectly competitive model of costly trade between two countries. In setting their corporate taxes, governments non-cooperatively decide whether to discriminate between internationally mobile and immobile firms. We find the Nash equilibrium tax regimes. When trade costs are high countries impose a uniform tax on all firms while nations will discriminate between mobile and immobile firms when costs are low. At some trade costs, fiscal competition results in tax discrimination despite uniform taxation being socially preferable