IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecolet/v202y2021ics016517652100118x.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Mergers and innovation sharing

Author

Listed:
  • Denicolò, Vincenzo
  • Polo, Michele

Abstract

We extend the classic model of Perry and Porter (1985) to allow for cost-reducing innovations and in this setting we analyse the competitive effects of horizontal mergers. The analysis focuses on the innovation-sharing mechanism, whereby the merging firms share the results of their research, enlarging the base of application of inventions and hence the incentive to innovate. We show that if marginal costs are increasing, the innovation-sharing mechanism may more than offset the contractionary output effect that operates for any given state of the technology, making horizontal mergers pro-competitive even in the absence of synergies in production and research.

Suggested Citation

  • Denicolò, Vincenzo & Polo, Michele, 2021. "Mergers and innovation sharing," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 202(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecolet:v:202:y:2021:i:c:s016517652100118x
    DOI: 10.1016/j.econlet.2021.109841
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S016517652100118X
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.econlet.2021.109841?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Farrell, Joseph & Shapiro, Carl, 1990. "Horizontal Mergers: An Equilibrium Analysis," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 80(1), pages 107-126, March.
    2. Chad Syverson, 2011. "What Determines Productivity?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 49(2), pages 326-365, June.
    3. Cabral, Luis, 2018. "Standing on the Shoulders of Dwarfs: Dominant Firms and Innovation Incentives," CEPR Discussion Papers 13115, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    4. Stephen W. Salant & Sheldon Switzer & Robert J. Reynolds, 1983. "Losses From Horizontal Merger: The Effects of an Exogenous Change in Industry Structure on Cournot-Nash Equilibrium," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 98(2), pages 185-199.
    5. Denicolò, Vincenzo & Polo, Michele, 2018. "Duplicative research, mergers and innovation," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 166(C), pages 56-59.
    6. Federico, Giulio & Langus, Gregor & Valletti, Tommaso, 2017. "A simple model of mergers and innovation," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 157(C), pages 136-140.
    7. Perry, Martin K & Porter, Robert H, 1985. "Oligopoly and the Incentive for Horizontal Merger," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 75(1), pages 219-227, March.
    8. Bruno Jullien & Yassine Lefouili, 2018. "Horizontal mergers and innovation," Post-Print hal-03263838, HAL.
    9. Motta, Massimo & Tarantino, Emanuele, 2021. "The effect of horizontal mergers, when firms compete in prices and investments," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    10. Arijit Mukherjee & Prabal Roy chowdhury, 2013. "Innovation and social desirability of merger," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 33(1), pages 348-360.
    11. Bruno Jullien & Yassine Lefouili, 2018. "Horizontal Mergers And Innovation‡," Journal of Competition Law and Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 14(3), pages 364-392.
    12. repec:wly:soecon:v:83:1:y:2016:p:202-235 is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Robin Kleer, 2012. "The effect of mergers on the incentive to invest in cost-reducing innovations," Economics of Innovation and New Technology, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(3), pages 287-322, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Mukherjee, Arijit & Ray, Achintya, 2024. "Pro-competitive merger under R&D revisited," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 239(C).
    2. Mukherjee, Arijit, 2023. "Merger and product innovation under cross ownership and cooperative R&D," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 233(C).
    3. Lefouili, Yassine & Madio, Leonardo, 2025. "Mergers and Investments: Where Do We Stand?," TSE Working Papers 25-1617, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Justin P. Johnson & Andrew Rhodes, 2021. "Multiproduct mergers and quality competition," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 52(3), pages 633-661, September.
    2. Cabolis, C. & Manasakis, C. & Moreno, D. & Petrakis, E., 2021. "The interactions of R&D investments and horizontal mergers," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 187(C), pages 507-534.
    3. Motta, Massimo & Tarantino, Emanuele, 2021. "The effect of horizontal mergers, when firms compete in prices and investments," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    4. Haucap, Justus & Rasch, Alexander & Stiebale, Joel, 2019. "How mergers affect innovation: Theory and evidence," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 283-325.
    5. Calvano, Emilio & Polo, Michele, 2021. "Market power, competition and innovation in digital markets: A survey," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 54(C).
    6. Vincenzo Denicolò & Michele Polo, 2018. "The innovation theory of harm: an appraisal," IEFE Working Papers 103, IEFE, Center for Research on Energy and Environmental Economics and Policy, Universita' Bocconi, Milano, Italy.
    7. Simon Loertscher & Leslie M. Marx, 2022. "Incomplete Information Bargaining with Applications to Mergers, Investment, and Vertical Integration," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 112(2), pages 616-649, February.
    8. Etro, Federico, 2019. "Mergers of complements and entry in innovative industries," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 65(C), pages 302-326.
    9. Roberto Cellini, 2021. "Whom should I merge with? How product substitutability affects merger profitability," Economia e Politica Industriale: Journal of Industrial and Business Economics, Springer;Associazione Amici di Economia e Politica Industriale, vol. 48(3), pages 337-353, September.
    10. Ivaldi, Marc & Cojoc, Anca & Maier-Rigaud, Frank & März, Oliver, 2020. "Horizontal cooperation on investment: Evidence from mobile network sharing," CEPR Discussion Papers 14770, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    11. Haucap, Justus & Stiebale, Joel, 2023. "Non-price effects of mergers and acquisitions," DICE Discussion Papers 402, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf Institute for Competition Economics (DICE).
    12. Øystein Foros & Bjørn Hansen & Thibaud Vergé, 2023. "Co-operative investment by downstream rivals: network sharing in telecom markets," Journal of Regulatory Economics, Springer, vol. 64(1), pages 34-47, December.
    13. Igor Letina & Armin Schmutzler & Regina Seibel, 2024. "Killer Acquisitions And Beyond: Policy Effects On Innovation Strategies," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 65(2), pages 591-622, May.
    14. Takeshi FUKASAWA & Hiroshi OHASHI, 2023. "Long-run Effect of a Horizontal Merger and Its Remedial Standards," Discussion papers 23001, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    15. Giulio Federico & Fiona Scott Morton & Carl Shapiro, 2020. "Antitrust and Innovation: Welcoming and Protecting Disruption," Innovation Policy and the Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 20(1), pages 125-190.
    16. Volker Nocke & Nicolas Schutz, 2018. "An Aggregative Games Approach to Merger Analysis in Multiproduct-Firm Oligopoly," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2018_024, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany.
    17. Bennato, Anna Rita & Davies, Stephen & Mariuzzo, Franco & Ormosi, Peter, 2021. "Mergers and innovation: Evidence from the hard disk drive market," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 77(C).
    18. Bakaouka, Elpiniki & Escrihuela-Villar, Marc & Ferrarese, Walter, 2024. "Horizontal mergers with Bertrand competition and convex costs," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 128(C), pages 60-67.
    19. Alexandre Carbonnel, 2021. "Can foreclosure benefit consumers? The case of innovation in new markets," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 41(3), pages 1471-1480.
    20. José Luis Moraga‐González & Evgenia Motchenkova & Saish Nevrekar, 2022. "Mergers and innovation portfolios," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 53(4), pages 641-677, December.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:ecolet:v:202:y:2021:i:c:s016517652100118x. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/ecolet .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.