More from the Author

• Article | Strategic Management Journal | 2018

  Threat of Platform-Owner Entry and Complementor Responses: Evidence from the Mobile App Market

  Wen Wen and Feng Zhu

  We examine how app developers on the Android mobile platform adjust their innovation efforts (rate and direction) and value-capture strategies in response to Google’s entry threat and actual entry into their markets. We find that, after Google’s entry threat increases, affected developers reduce innovation and raise the prices for the affected apps. Once Google enters, the developers reduce innovation and increase prices further. However, app developers’ incentives to innovate are not completely suppressed; rather, they shift innovation to unaffected and new apps. Given many apps already offering similar features, Google’s entry may reduce such social inefficiency.

  Keywords: platform-owner entry; entry threat; innovation; complementors; mobile app industry; Technology Platform; Mobile Technology; Market Entry and Exit; Price; Innovation and Invention;

  Citation:

  Wen, Wen, and Feng Zhu. "Threat of Platform-Owner Entry and Complementor Responses: Evidence from the Mobile App Market." Strategic Management Journal 40, no. 9 (September 2019): 1336–1367.  View Details

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• Case | HBS Case Collection | January 2017 (Revised August 2019)

  X Fire Paintball & Airsoft: Is Amazon a Friend or Foe? (A)

  Feng Zhu and Angela Acocella

  Three years after launching his brick-and-mortar store, X Fire Paintball and Airsoft, Steve Herbert Sr. and his sons began selling products on Amazon.com’s third-party Marketplace, and online sales expanded rapidly. Over time, X Fire noticed that products of which it had once been the only seller were now being sold by Amazon straight from X Fire’s suppliers, effectively cutting X Fire out. Amazon was also ignoring the minimum advertised price (MAP) set by manufacturers. How should X Fire defend itself? Now Amazon representatives were approaching X Fire to encourage them to sell on Amazon’s smaller but growing Canadian Marketplace. How should X Fire respond to this opportunity?

  Keywords: Ethics; Competition; Market Platforms; Online Technology; Small Business; Retail Industry; Canada;

  Citation:

  Zhu, Feng, and Angela Acocella. "X Fire Paintball & Airsoft: Is Amazon a Friend or Foe? (A)." Harvard Business School Case 617-046, January 2017. (Revised August 2019.)  View Details

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• Teaching Note | HBS Case Collection | May 2019 (Revised August 2019)

  X Fire Paintball & Airsoft: Is Amazon a Friend or Foe? (A) and (B)

  Feng Zhu

  Teaching Note for HBS Nos. 617-046 and 617-047.

  Citation:

  Zhu, Feng. "X Fire Paintball & Airsoft: Is Amazon a Friend or Foe? (A) and (B)." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 619-072, May 2019. (Revised August 2019.)  View Details

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