Publications
Publications
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- Faculty Publications (17)
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- January 2022
- Article
Artificial Intelligence, Data-Driven Learning, and the Decentralized Structure of Platform Ecosystems
By: David R. Clough and Andy Wu
Gregory, Henfridsson, Kaganer, and Kyriakou (2020) highlight the important role of data and AI as strategic resources that platforms may use to enhance user value. However, their article overlooks a significant conceptual distinction: the installed base of...
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- July 2021
- Article
Information Transparency, Multihoming, and Platform Competition: A Natural Experiment in the Daily Deals Market
By: Hui Li and Feng Zhu
Platform competition is shaped by the likelihood of multi-homing (i.e., complementors or consumers adopt more than one platform). To take advantage of multi-homing, platform firms often attempt to motivate their rivals’ high-performing complementors to adopt their own...
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- February 2021
- Article
Platform Diffusion at Temporary Gatherings: Social Coordination and Ecosystem Emergence
By: Tommy Pan Fang, Andy Wu and David R. Clough
Software platforms create value by cultivating an ecosystem of complementary products and services. Existing explanations for how a prospective complementor chooses platforms to join assume the complementor has rich information about the range of available platforms....
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Keywords:
Innovation Ecosystems;
Technology Diffusion;
Hackathon;
Contagion;
Software Applications;
Software Development;
Software Engineering;
Technology Strategy;
Technology Adoption;
Technological Innovation;
Information Infrastructure;
Innovation Strategy;
Digital Platforms;
Network Effects;
Applications and Software;
Information Technology;
Technology Industry;
Computer Industry;
Information Technology Industry;
Video Game Industry
- October 2020 (Revised August 2022)
- Case
Epic Games: Nineteen Eighty-Fortnight
By: Andy Wu, Miaomiao Zhang and Christopher Zhang
In the midst of intensifying public and political attention towards the market power of big technology, Epic Games in 2020 challenged the status quo that has existed for years in the Apple iOS and Google Android mobile application marketplaces and payment systems....
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- 2018
- Article
Threat of Platform-Owner Entry and Complementor Responses: Evidence from the Mobile App Market
By: 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,...
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- June 21, 2019
- Article
When Tech Companies Compete on Their Own Platforms
By: Feng Zhu
One common complaint from third parties about platform businesses is that they see what succeeds on their platforms and then enter the most profitable areas themselves, often decimating third parties in the process. Studies have identified several motivations for...
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- Article
Friends or Foes? Examining Platform Owners' Entry into Complementors' Spaces
By: Feng Zhu
As platform owners continue to expand their ecosystems, many of them have started to provide consumers with their own complementary applications. These moves position the platform owners as direct competitors to their complementors. This paper surveys empirical studies...
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- October 2018
- Article
Competing with Complementors: An Empirical Look at Amazon.com
By: Feng Zhu and Qihong Liu
Platform owners sometimes enter complementors' product spaces to compete against them directly. Prior studies have offered two possible explanations for such entries: platform owners may target the most successful complementors so as to appropriate value from their...
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- 2017
- Working Paper
Threat of Platform-Owner Entry and Complementor Responses: Evidence from the Mobile App Market
By: 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,...
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- July–August 2013
- Article
Complementary Goods: Creating, Capturing, and Competing for Value
By: Taylan Yalcin, Elie Ofek, Oded Koenigsberg and Eyal Biyalogorsky
This paper studies the strategic interaction between firms producing strictly complementary products. With strict complements, a consumer derives positive utility only when both products are used together. We show that value-capture and value-creation problems arise...
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- 2010
- Working Paper
When Open Architecture Beats Closed: The Entrepreneurial Use of Architectural Knowledge
This paper describes how entrepreneurial firms can use superior architectural knowledge to open up a technical system to gain strategic advantage. The strategy involves, first, identifying "bottlenecks" in the existing system, and then creating a new open architecture...
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- September 2006
- Article
With Friends Like These: The Art of Managing Complementors
By: David B. Yoffie and Mary Kwak
Keywords:
Management
- 2005
- Working Paper
Wintel: Cooperation or Conflict
We study the incentives of complementors (producers of complementary products) to cooperate vs. compete and how these interact. In a system of complements, like the PC, the value of the final product depends on how well the different components work together. This, in...
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- January 1998 (Revised February 2006)
- Background Note
Creating Competitive Advantage
By: Pankaj Ghemawat and Jan W. Rivkin
A firm such as Schering-Plough that earns superior, long-run financial returns within its industry is said to enjoy a competitive advantage over its rivals. This note examines the logic of how firms create competitive advantage. It emphasizes two themes: First, to...
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- Research Summary
Distributed Innovation in Open Systems—The Role of Modularity
Distributed innovation in open systems is an important trend in the modern global economy. As education levels rise and communication costs fall, more people have the means and motivation to innovate. Supply chains now stretch around the world as firms outsource...
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- Research Summary
Overview
By: Feng Zhu
Professor Zhu’s research focuses on the design of platform business models and its impact on platform performance. Platforms have become central to our economy. A platform is a product or service that enables two or more customer groups to interact. For example,...
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- Research Summary
Overview
By: Andy Wu
How can technology entrepreneurs build competitive advantage from the ground up? Professor Andy Wu conducts scholarly research and develops course materials that document how technology entrepreneurs can (1) organize for innovation to create new market opportunities...
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Keywords:
Strategy;
Entrepreneurship;
Venture Capital;
Growth Management;
Organizational Design;
Organizational Structure;
Technology Platform;
Technological Innovation;
Information Technology Industry;
Retail Industry;
Pharmaceutical Industry;
Video Game Industry;
Media and Broadcasting Industry;
United States;
China;
Southeast Asia;
South Asia