14th ZEW Conference on the Economics of Information and Communication Technologies

On June 3 and 4, 2016, ZEW hosted the fourteenth international conference, "The Economics of Information and Communication Technologies", thereby once again making a considerable contribution to this field of research. Around 70 participants, among them numerous renowned researchers, discussed scientific papers applying theoretical or empirical approaches to study the increasing digitalisation. The conference has now become an established event in the calendar of economists whose research focuses on information and communication technologies. Indeed, the event is now regularly funded, as was the case this year, by the German Research Foundation (DFG).

In total, 39 current research projects were presented and subsequently discussed amongst scientists with a similar research interest. Particular interest was shown in sessions and presentations on topics such as "Big Data", "Cloud Computing", "Digital Platforms" and "Telecommunications Markets". Three invited sessions were also organised by Florian Stahl (University of Mannheim) and Michael Zhang (Hong Kong University of Science and Technology). These dealt with the topics of digital market strategies and online social networks.

Locations where innovation activities are concentrated enjoy significant benefits

Two particular highlights of the conference were the keynote speeches given by Chris Forman (Georgia Institute of Technology) and Joshua Gans (University of Toronto). Chris Forman considered what exactly has driven the increasing concentration of US innovation activity in the San Francisco Bay Area, observed since 1990. His results show that this growth in innovation cannot only be observed in the field of information and communication technologies, but also for a number of other industries and technologies. Initial findings indicate that the benefits of agglomeration – which include, for example, low transportation costs, knowledge spillover, a high volume of venture capital and access to a talented workforce – could have been responsible for this development.

Joshua Gans gave an insight into his current research, which focuses on the interdependence of the competition intensity in a market, the complaint behaviours of consumers and the quality of products provided by businesses. To test the theoretical model, the authors of the study are applying it to the US American airline market and are measuring the complaint behaviours of consumers by observing their comments on twitter. Their results show that the number of complaints made following a negative shock on quality, such as delayed flights, is significantly higher if the market is highly concentrated. At the same time, it is in such highly concentrated markets that airlines are more likely to respond to complaints. A further highlight was the conference dinner held at Burg Windeck in Weinheim. The dinner enabled researchers to network with one another and also provided an opportunity for the Economics Prize to be awarded.