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2019/2020  KAN-CCMVI2090U  Management of Digital Platforms

English Title
Management of Digital Platforms

Course information

Language English
Course ECTS 7.5 ECTS
Type Elective
Level Full Degree Master
Duration Summer
Start time of the course Summer
Timetable Course schedule will be posted at calendar.cbs.dk
Max. participants 80
Study board
Study Board for MSc in Economics and Business Administration
Course coordinator
  • Jörg Claussen - Department of Strategy and Innovation (SI)
For academic questions related to the course, please contact instructor Jörg Claussen at jcl.si@cbs.dk
Main academic disciplines
  • Managerial economics
  • Information technology
  • Management
Teaching methods
  • Online teaching
Last updated on 16/04/2020

Relevant links

Learning objectives
To achieve the grade 12, students should meet the following learning objectives with no or only minor mistakes or errors:
  • Define the characteristics of digital platform markets
  • Analyze how firms design or re-design their strategies to succeed in a digital platform market
  • Assess how platforms’ characteristics influence competition across industries and between newly born and established firms
  • Explain how users on digital platforms behave
  • Analyze how regulators respond to changes introduced by digital platforms to preserve consumers’ interest and healthy competition
Course prerequisites
Completed Bachelor degree or equivalent
Examination
Management of Digital Platforms:
Exam ECTS 7.5
Examination form Home assignment - written product
Individual or group exam Individual exam
Size of written product Please see text below
4 hour home assignment. No requirement for maximum number of pages.
Assignment type Written assignment
Duration Written product to be submitted on specified date and time.
Grading scale 7-point grading scale
Examiner(s) One internal examiner
Exam period Summer, Ordinary exam: 4 hour home assignment in the period of 27–31 July 2020
Retake exam: 4 hour home assignment in the period of 28 September–2 October 2020
3rd attempt (2nd retake) exam: 72-hour home assignment- 23-26 November 2020 – for all ISUP courses simultaneously

Exam schedules available on https:/​/​www.cbs.dk/​uddannelse/​international-summer-university-programme-isup/​courses-and-exams
Make-up exam/re-exam
Same examination form as the ordinary exam
Retake exam: 4 hour home assignment, new exam question
Exam form for 3rd attempt (2nd retake): 72-hour home project assignment, max. 10 pages.
Course content, structure and pedagogical approach
Nowadays digital platforms are ubiquitous and range from social media to e-commerce, payment networks, and operating systems. Digital platforms operate as intermediaries (e.g. Booking.com, Amazon, iOS, Tinder) in business-to-business and business-to-consumer environments as well as among individuals. The drivers of platform markets’ success are complex, and they can be generally summarized into network effects, technology diffusion, and users’ switching costs. In addition, digital platforms markets introduced new business models and novel pricing structures, which reshaped both the competition between firms and their relationship with consumers.
 
The course addresses these fundamental and contemporary issues and organizes around five main questions:
 
What are the characteristics that define a digital platform market?
How do firms design or re-design their strategies to succeed in a digital platform market?
How do platforms’ characteristics influence competition across industries and between newly born and established firms?
How do users behave in this new environment?
How do the regulators respond to changes introduced by digital platforms to preserve consumers’ interest and healthy competition?
 
Preliminary assignment: Identify one digital platform and be prepared to present in in two minutes (no slides) in the first class.
 
Class 1: Characteristics of two-sided markets
Class 2: Network effects and switching costs
Class 3: Market structure
Class 4: Adoption and diffusion
Class 5: Pricing strategies in two-sided markets
Class 6: Complementors
 
Feedback activity: Mock exam
 
Class 7: Compatibility
Class 8: New business models
Class 9: Competition and disruption
Class 10: Consumer 2.0
Class 11: Quo Vadis Digitization?
Description of the teaching methods
This year all courses are taught digitally over the Internet. Instructors will apply a mixture of direct teaching through a live link (like Skype, Team, Zoom…) and indirect, where visual pre-recorded material is uploaded on Canvas. The instructor will inform participants about the precise format on Canvas.
Feedback during the teaching period
Mock exam covering lectures 1-6 and discussion of expected answers
Student workload
Preliminary assignment 20 hours
Classroom attendance 33 hours
Preparation 126 hours
Feedback activity 7 hours
Examination 20 hours
Further Information
Preliminary Assignment: To help students get maximum value from ISUP courses, instructors provide a reading or a small number of readings or video clips to be read or viewed before the start of classes with a related task scheduled for class 1 in order to 'jump-start' the learning process.
 
Course timetable is available on https://www.cbs.dk/uddannelse/international-summer-university-programme-isup/courses-and-exams
 
We reserve the right to cancel the course if we do not get enough applications. This will be communicated on https://www.cbs.dk/uddannelse/international-summer-university-programme-isup/courses-and-exams end March 2020.
Expected literature

Mandatory readings:

 

Class 1: Characteristics of two-sided markets
Armstrong, M., 2006. Competition in two‐sided markets. The RAND Journal of Economics, 37(3), 668-691.
 
Class 2: Network effects and switching costs
Tucker, C. (2008). Identifying formal and informal influence in technology adoption with network externalities. Management Science, 54(12), 2024-2038.
 
Class 3: Market structure
Arthur, W. B. (1989): Competing Technologies, Increasing Returns, and Lock-In by Historical Events in: The Economic Journal, 99:394, pp. 116-131.
 
Class 4: Adoption and diffusion
Rietveld, J., & Eggers, J. P. (2018): Demand heterogeneity in platform markets: Implications for complementors, in: Organization Science, 29(2), pp. 304-322.
 
Class 5: Pricing strategies in two-sided markets
Nair, H. (2007): Intertemporal Price Discrimination with Forward-Looking Consumers: Application to the US Market for Console Video-Games, Quantitative Marketing Economics, 5: 239-292.
 
Class 6: Complementors
Boudreau, K. J. (2012) Let a thousand flowers bloom? An early look at at large numbers of software app developers and patterns of innovation. Organization Science, 23(5): 1409-1427.
 
Class 7: Compatibility
Kretschmer, T. and Claussen J. (2016) Generational transitions in platform Markets – The role of backward compatibility, Strategy Science, 1(2): 90-104.
 
Class 8: New business models
Claussen, J. and Kretschmer T. and Mayrhofer P. (2013) The effect of rewarding user engagement: The case of Facebook Apps. Information System Research, 24(1): 186-200.
 
Class 9: Competition and disruption
Bennett, V.M., Seamans, R. and Zhu, F. (2015) Cannibalization and option value effects on secondary markets: Evidence from the U.S. concert industry. Strategic Management Journal. 36: 1599-1614.
 
Class 10: Consumer 2.0
Aguiar, L. and Waldfogel, J., 2018. As streaming reaches flood stage, does it stimulate or depress music sales?. International Journal of Industrial Organization, 57, pp.278-307.
 
Class 11: Quo Vadis Digitization?
Huang, J., Reiley, D. and Riabov, N., 2018. Measuring Consumer Sensitivity to Audio Advertising: A Field Experiment on Pandora Internet Radio, Working paper.

Last updated on 16/04/2020