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Franchise Bidding in the Water Industry- Auction Schemes and Investment Incentives

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  • Urs Meister

    (Institute for Strategy and Business Economics, University of Zurich)

Abstract

The periodical re-auction of a water monopoly concession causes the danger of underinvestment. If the life-time of specific assets such as water pipes exceeds the contract length and transferring the ownership of assets is difficult, the incumbent franchisee faces a hold-up problem. Using a simple auction model that considers the specifics of the piped water sector this paper shows that investment incentives may vary depending on the applied auction scheme. The model is designed as a two stage game, where the franchisee decides about investment on the first and competes with a potential market entrant on the second stage. Investment tends to be higher in sealed bid auctions than in an English auction, since the incumbent benefits from an information advantage. Additionally investment may vary in a first- and a second-price sealed bid auction depending on several factors such as costs or effectiveness of investment. The analysis is extended by a vertical separation.

Suggested Citation

  • Urs Meister, 2004. "Franchise Bidding in the Water Industry- Auction Schemes and Investment Incentives," Working Papers 0033, University of Zurich, Institute for Strategy and Business Economics (ISU).
    • Handle: RePEc:iso:wpaper:0033
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Michel Mougeot & Florence Naegelen, 2011. "Franchise bidding, regulation and investment costs," Review of Economic Design, Springer;Society for Economic Design, vol. 15(1), pages 37-58, March.
    2. Pasquale L. Scandizzo & Marco Ventura, 2008. "A model of public and private partnership through concession contracts," ISAE Working Papers 104, ISTAT - Italian National Institute of Statistics - (Rome, ITALY).
    3. Cécile Aubert & Philippe Bontems & François Salanié, 2006. "Le Renouvellement Périodique Des Contrats De Concession: Le Cas Des Services De L'Eau," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 77(4), pages 495-520, December.
    4. Carlos Costa, 2012. "On the Use of Reverse Auctions to Designate Universal Postal Service Providers," Chapters, in: Michael A. Crew & Paul R. Kleindorfer (ed.), Multi-Modal Competition and the Future of Mail, chapter 21, Edward Elgar Publishing.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Water; Networks; Franchise Bidding; Investment;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L95 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Transportation and Utilities - - - Gas Utilities; Pipelines; Water Utilities
    • L43 - Industrial Organization - - Antitrust Issues and Policies - - - Legal Monopolies and Regulation or Deregulation
    • D21 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Firm Behavior: Theory
    • Q25 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Water

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