Sunday 26 October 2014

Multi-sided platforms: making money, spending money and watching out for the competition folk: an event

"Multi-Sided Platforms: Business, Economics & Competition Policy" is an event organised by the UCL Faculty of Laws this coming Wednesday, 29 October 2014 from 13:00 to 19:30 GMT. According to the event's publicity material:
Old-style multi-sided platforms:
but the IP-driven variety are
more flexible -- and profitable
 
Multi-sided platforms are businesses that act as intermediaries between several interdependent groups of customers. They are central to many industries including payment systems, financial exchanges, advertising-supported media, much of online, and various kinds of marketplaces including shopping malls. Some of the largest IPOs in recent years have involved multisided platforms such as Facebook and, soon, Alibaba. They are also often at the centre of debates concerning competition policy and sectoral regulation. Google and Uber are two that are making headlines in the European Union.

This course will cover the unique business models followed by multi-sided businesses; the economics of multi-sided platforms and the industries they anchor; the applications of competition policy to multi-sided platforms; a survey of key competition policy and regulator matters involving these platforms; and tools and techniques for competition policy analysis.

The course will include presentations from several executives of platform startups including Will Page (Chief Economist at Spotify [and the person who tipped us off about this event]) and Alain Falys (Founder and CEO, Yoyo).

The course will consist of three segments:
  • The Business and Economics of Multi-sided Platforms.
  • Market Definition, Market Power, and Merger Analysis for Multi-sided Platforms
  • Abuse of Dominance and Coordinated Practices for Multi-sided Platforms
The course will draw extensively on examples of multi-sided platform cases involving online businesses and payments.
More details and registration here.

If any readers of this blog are in attendance, can they let us know of any interesting bits that they can share with us?

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