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Destructive Creation

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  • Calvano, Emilio

    (GREMAQ, Université de Toulouse 1 and Dept. of Economics, Stockholm School of Economics)

Abstract

"Destructive Creation" is the deliberate introduction of new, perhaps improved generations of durable goods that destroy, directly or indirectly, the usage value of units previously sold inducing consumers to repeat their purchase. This paper discusses this practice by a single seller in an infinite-horizon, discrete time model with heterogeneous consumers. Despite the lack of commitment power over future prices and introduction policies, this practice restores partially or totally market power even though consumers anticipate opportunistic behavior. However, the monopoly resorts "too much" to this mechanism from an ex-ante, profit maximizing perspective. High prices in earlier periods allow the seller to commit to defer innovation and therefore to maintain buyers' confidence over "durability". The paper characterizes the equilibrium properties of the resulting innovation cycles such as existence, uniqueness and asymptotic stability and discusses potential regulatory remedies in those instances where destructive creation generates economic inefficiencies. This theory applies, among others, to markets characterized by network externalities, compatibility issues, standard setting, social consumption and signal provision and may help explain many restrictive aftermarket practices as well as excessive add-on pricing without relying on any leverage hypothesis.

Suggested Citation

  • Calvano, Emilio, 2006. "Destructive Creation," SSE/EFI Working Paper Series in Economics and Finance 653, Stockholm School of Economics, revised 30 Dec 2007.
    • Handle: RePEc:hhs:hastef:0653
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Mario Coccia, 2017. "Disruptive firms," Papers 1710.06132, arXiv.org.
    2. Coccia, M., 2014. "Leadership-driven innovation & evolution of societies," MERIT Working Papers 2014-087, United Nations University - Maastricht Economic and Social Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (MERIT).
    3. Soete, Luc, 2012. "Maastricht Reflections on Innovation," MERIT Working Papers 2012-001, United Nations University - Maastricht Economic and Social Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (MERIT).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    durable goods; aftermarkets; planned obsolescence;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D42 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - Monopoly
    • L12 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Monopoly; Monopolization Strategies
    • L15 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Information and Product Quality
    • O31 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives

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