Strategic Growth of Firms in the Digital Economy: A Simonian Research Agenda

Strategic growth of firms, in the words of Herbert Simon, is within the framework of decision making under “massive and unending uncertainty.” In the rapidly changing digital economy, the cycle of winning and losing and asset redistribution intensifies as the speed of information exchange increases. It is thus more necessary than ever to find explanatory theories to describe, model, and predict the emerging market structures of the hypercompetitive digital economy. In this paper, we draw upon several Simonian models of bounded rationality in decision making and propose a research agenda for strategic growth of firms in the digital economy. The agenda consists of three major topics: (1) skew distributions in the digital market competition, (2) empirical laws of information use, and (3) a framework of strategic information systems. Some ongoing projects related to the agenda are discussed

Transforming Competitiveness by Introducing Digital Platforms

The purpose of the proposed paper is to study the specific factors shaping the benefits of information platforms as an innovative institutional form and model of doing business. Active dissemination of the business model of online platforms radically transforms the competitive landscape of the market environment. The task of determining the sources and mechanisms for studying the changes that are taking place is being updated. New areas of competition include competition between hierarchical and network structures, between global «structuring» platforms, competition in dominant platform ecosystems, the interaction between platforms operating in competitive markets, competition between organizers and users, and between platform users. The impact of platforming on cross-industry, regional and international competition is determined. The sources of competitive advantages of platforms are investigated. These include reliance on data as the main factor of production, changing the cost structure of entering the market; the possibility of building large-scale networks, niche specialization, combining the effects of increasing the scale of production and demand, multihoming, multi productivity, network effects.   Cite this paper: Nosova, Olga; Lypov, Volodymyr (2021). "Transforming Competitiveness by Introducing Digital Platforms" Journal of World Economy: Transformations & Transitions (JOWETT) 1(03):11. DOI: https://doi.org/10.52459/jowett13111221     

Market and Labour Control in Digital Capitalism

Theorists of post capitalism have recently argued for a more or less inevitable end to capitalism. They assume that private accumulation is systematically blocked by the inability of capitalist corporations to create revenues by setting prices as they lose control over the reproduction of their commodities and that in this process, capitalist labour will eventually disappear. Drawing on a case study of Amazon and thoughts on the policies of other leading digital corporations, we challenge these assumptions. Key corporate players of digitization are trying to become powerful monopolies and have partly succeeded in doing so, using the network effects and scaling opportunities of digital goods and building socio-technical ecosystems. These strategies have led to the development of in part isomorphic structures, hence creating a situation of oligopolistic market competition. We draw on basic assumptions of monopoly capital theory to argue that in this situation labour process rationalization becomes key to the corporation’s competitive strategies. We see the expansion of digital control and the organizational structures applied by key corporate players of the digital economy as evidence for the expansion of capitalist labour, not its reduction

Media Industries as Structure: Objectivism and the Societal Context - Case Study: The Political Economy of Television Sports Rights

The chapter as a whole will offer an outline how political economy has come to operate across different aspects of media, cultural and communication studies, and attempt to outline a methodology for how best to implement this approach for research. My contribution sits alongside this, offering a case study where I reflect quite openly about how I myself use political economy in my research, how exactly I went about doing this from a methodological standpoint, and also how effective it was as a method of research. I therefore frame my contribution around a piece of my research that I have actually done where I took a political economy approach. More specifically, readers will find below a piece that thinks about the how's and why's of using this approach for television sports rights. I have also used a political economy theory for the analysis of public service broadcasting (see Iosifidis, 2007, 2010), media ownership (see Iosifidis, 1997, 2011) and social media (see Iosifidis and Wheeler, 2016)

Skills are not enough : the globalisation of knowledge and the future Uk economy

The UK’s policy response to globalisation centres on building a highly skilled population and competing in higher value market places: this is not enough. The UK needs to move beyond a ‘national-centric view of the world’ and to place a greater emphasis on active demand side policy that engages with employers and focuses on job creation, job quality and labour supply

Subsidiarity and Proportionality in the Single Market: An EU fit for inclusive growth

This report offers a fresh perspective on the principles of subsidiarity and proportionality in the European Union based on a thorough-going economic analysis. Specifically, the report uses the EU Single Market as a case to discuss shortcomings and potential improvements in five key policy areas. It reviews how the principles of subsid- iarity and proportionality can help boost growth in the EU at the aggregate country level – while at the same time allowing EU regions to benefit from growth. The report focuses on the regional level as economic growth has been uneven across the EU’s regions over the last decade and, consequently, growing disparities between re- gions have emerged. This alone merits a review on how we can reconcile the twin objectives in the future

Product Differentiation Costs and Global Competition

The growing competitive intensity on the markets determines the emergence of competition costs that are expressed at a corporate level and have implicit repercussions for the supply system. This type of costs makes it possible to identify a close link between competition costs and supply differentiation costs. Classification by competitive intensity presupposes that the analysis performed identifies the classification of company costs as the discriminating element, in terms of the competitive pressure of the context in which the firm operates. The emergence of competition costs is linked to an attempt to squeeze them as an aspect of vertical, or more specifically, horizontal cooperation strategies.Product Differentiation; Differentiation Costs; Over-Supply; Global Competition; Marketing; Market-Driven Management; Global Corporations; Global Markets DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.4468/2005.1.06garbelli

New Economic Analysis of Law: Beyond Technocracy and Market Design

This special issue on New Economic Analysis of Law features illuminating syntheses of social science and law. What would law and economics look like if macroeconomics were a concern of scholars now focused entirely on microeconomics? Do emerging online phenomena, such as algorithmic pricing and platform capitalism, promise to perfect economic theories of market equilibrium, or challenge their foundations? How did simplified economic models gain ideological power in policy circles, and how can they be improved or replaced? This issue highlights scholars whose work has made the legal academy more than an “importer” of ideas from other disciplines—and who have, instead, shown that rigorous legal analysis is fundamental to understanding economic affairs.The essays in this issue should help ensure that policymakers’ turn to new economic thinking promotes inclusive prosperity. Listokin, Bayern, and Kwak have identified major aporias in popular applications of law and economics methods. Ranchordás, Stucke, and Ezrachi have demonstrated that technological fixes, ranging from digital ranking and rating systems to artificial intelligence-driven personal assistants, are unlikely to improve matters unless they are wisely regulated. McCluskey and Rahman offer a blueprint for democratic regulation, which shapes the economy in productive ways and alleviates structural inequalities. Taken as a whole, this issue of Critical Analysis of Law shows that legal thinkers are not merely importers of ideas and models from economics, but also active participants, with a great deal to contribute to social science research