Junior Research Group Competition and Innovation

Focus of the Junior Research Group

Influence of Market Concentration and Competitive Pressure on Productivity and Innovation
Impact of Financial Interconnectedness of Companies on Corporate Strategies
Design of Rules and Processes in Technology Standardisation Procedures
Information Flow Between Companies and Its Effects on Price and Innovation Strategies

The Junior Research Group “Competition and Innovation” addresses questions in competition economics and policy, particularly at the interface to innovation economics. The overarching theme is the analysis and optimal design of competition rules to improve the functioning of both goods and services markets and technology markets, thus improving the well-being of society as a whole. By complementing innovation-friendly policies and the legal protection of intangible assets, optimal competition policy provides incentives for developing new ideas and technologies without hampering competition by disproportionately restricting access for third parties. To this end, the Junior Research Group studies the incentive effects of the legal and institutional framework on the strategic behaviour of companies and uses these insights to evaluate competition policy institutions and rules from an innovation economics and innovation policy perspective.

The Junior Research Group “Competition and Innovation” is the central point of contact for competition issues at ZEW, while also sharing its expertise with other research units in the context of interdisciplinary projects and studies. The Mannheim Centre for Competition and Innovation (MaCCI), jointly run by the University of Mannheim’s School of Law and Economics and ZEW, plays a particularly important role.

This project investigates the effects of financial interdependencies of firms on corporate strategies in the product and technology market. One of the key aims of the project is to analyse how minority holdings affect firms’ price and non-price strategies, and how such ownership structures change market outcomes through their effects on price markups and innovation. In its initial phase in 2019 and 2020, the project was funded by the international research programme “Strengthening Efficiency and Competitiveness in the European Knowledge Economies” (SEEK) at ZEW.

We study firms' strategic disclosure of private information, asking if and how firms can affect the degree and type of competition in their respective markets. We also explore how firms adapt their disclosure behavior (and strategies) when their competitive and regulatory environments change or when a competitor's private information leaks. Two areas are particularly interesting: innovation and patents (and firms' disclosure decisions outside the patent system) and privacy & data security (and firms' decisions to disclose details about their data practices).