Entry into a network industry: consumers’ expectations and firms’ pricing policies

Abstract

This paper presents a model of entry into a network industry. The entrant tries to attract the customer base of the incumbent service provider. While the entrant is more efficient, the incumbent enjoys an advantage thanks to a bias in consumers’ expectations. Buyers enter the game with heterogenous beliefs as to which of the two firms is going to win competition. Then expectations converge - through higher order beliefs - and select one winner, who ends up being the single supplier. The path of expectations convergence crucially depends on the pricing policy followed by firms: so equilibrium beliefs are endogenous. Depending on parameter values, one of two outcomes obtains: (i) the incumbent is able to exclude the entrant, by lowering his price below the monopoly level; (ii) the entrant is successful, by undercutting the incumbent price. Productive efficiency and consumers’ welfare are hurt by exclusion; the entry threat is beneficial to consumers anyway. Imposing compatibility among networks is welfare improving, as it removes the exclusionary potential enjoyed by the incumbent.network industries, critical mass, entry, exclusion, higher order beliefs