标题：Durable Good Innovation and Product LineChoice

汇报人：冯泓（西南财经大学）

功夫：2:00-3:30pm, September 27

地址：拉斯维加斯9888新楼217教室

Abstract:

This paper studies the optimal vertical product line decision of a monopolist who produces a perfectly durable good to vertically differentiatedconsumers, as exogenous innovations are adopted periodically. The paperprovides an analytic framework to determine that when new models withhigher qualities become available the firm will keep producing old models or not. Two demonstrating consumer type distributions are used toshow two effects, named “alleviation for the future” and “pressure fromthe past”, which both lead the firm to produce old models and employ amulti-product line, but under different conditions and through oppositemechanisms. Moreover, when the first effect is strong, the second effectmay stop working. Many examples from different industries resonate wellwith the theory.