Optimal monopoly market area spanning in multidimensional commodity spaces

✍ Scribed by Gábor Péli; Arjen van Witteloostuijn

• Book ID: 102500864
• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 2009
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 195 KB
• Volume: 30
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0143-6570
• DOI: 10.1002/mde.1428

✦ Synopsis

Abstract

A monopoly firm locates in multidimensional product characteristics' space by setting a price that maximizes its profits. The monopoly market area (MMA) it serves strikes the happy medium between lower price and larger MMA, assuming absence of price discrimination, by setting the price at the MMA margins. The MMA takes different shapes, such as hyperspheres or hypercubes, depending on how customers perceive the product distance from their ideal tastes. Commodity space dimensionality, a measure of customer taste elaboration, has a robust effect on optimization: the optimal MMA stretch increases and price decreases with dimensionality, with different customer sensitivity patterns in place. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.