15.879  Research Seminar in System Dynamics

Homework for Week 11: Multi-Product Competition

Hi all,

Next week will be our final week of class, with the PhD Colloquium scheduled for the following week. I have a few different plans for our final class:

1) For our homework modeling task, let's elaborate on your Uber models from this week to consider the case of two competing two-sided mobility platforms. Extend your models to consider that consumers have a choice of which mobility service to use, and so do drivers. You may find it useful to use the 'logit' formulation I have mentioned previously for this purpose. Explore how your model responds to factors such as platform pricing strategies and the extent to which consumers are willing to switch between platforms.

2) I have assigned a couple of readings for discussion on the topic of multi-product competition. The first is Pistorius and Utterback's 'Multi-mode Interaction Among Technologies', a relatively little-known paper. The second is by me and Sergey, a working paper on the role of intergenerational hybrids in technological transitions. This is an older version as we are currently reworking it, the status of which we can explain in class.

3) Finally, we will hear from Dustin and Erik about their research efforts.

Have a great weekend!

Cheers,
David.

Announced on 27 April 2018  4:25  p.m. by David R. Keith

PhD Colloquium, Fall Semester Scheduling

Hi all,

A couple of announcements:

1) The MIT-UAlbany-WPI PhD Colloquium is scheduled for Friday May 11th from 9am-4pm in Albany. This is an important event for presenting your work and networking with your peers, so I am cancelling our last day of 15.879 to facilitate your attendance. It is our expectation that all SD PhD students will attend unless you have a very compelling reason not to. I'm sure that the opportunity exists for other PhD and Masters students to attend also if you wish to.

Please RSVP here: https://goo.gl/forms/o7YdK7WYNdRITra33

We will pay for car rental and any other expenses - please coordinate and drive together (for maximum fun).

2) BREAKING NEWS! I will be teaching 15.879 again in the Fall and I WANT YOU! Tentatively, the schedule will be Fridays 9-12, but this is open to negotiation. As usual, it is our expectation that all SD PhD students will take 15.879, regardless of how many times you have taken it before. Other PhD students and ambitious Masters students are also very welcome to participate.

Importantly, the format of 15.879 is going to be quite different in the Fall. The primary emphasis is going to be on 'doing', with participants working in small groups (me included) to write papers that we will submit to leading journals at the end of the semester. My goals with this class are to enhance our within-group collaboration and learning, to build your experience with the publication process, and to boost our collective research output.

I have some prospective topics in mind, but I am also keen to hear what research ideas you have, so get thinking!

Cheers,
David.

Announced on 24 April 2018  11:03  a.m. by David R. Keith

Homework for Week 10 - Platform Dynamics

Hi all,

At the end of our last class we got to the topic of platforms, which I think deserves elaboration. For this coming week we are going to do two things:

1) I have assigned a couple of readings from the tech strategy literature on platforms: Bresnahan and Greenstein (1999) and Gawer and Henderson (2007). Read these and we will discuss at the start of class.

2) We will all complete a small modeling challenge: to build your own small and parsimonious model of a two-sided platform market, for which we will use the example of Uber. Consider how the incentive to become an active user of Uber (as the consumer) is influenced by the availability of cars, and how the incentive to become a regular driver (as the producer) is influenced by consumer demand. For simplicity, let's all use the 'pickup time' (how many minutes it takes for a car to arrive) to be the metric that indicates the balance between passengers and cars.

What conditions are required for your platform to be successful, both in terms of user adoption and profitability?

Your model should be sufficiently general that it could be easily adapted to other two-sided markets such as Airbnb.

Please send me your running model (no units errors...) by Thursday evening before class.

Enjoy this nice weather too!

Cheers,
David.

Announced on 22 April 2018  8:43  a.m. by David R. Keith

Readings for this Week

Hi all,

I hope you are having a good (and dry) Patriot's Day.

I have added three readings on Stellar for our class this Friday, responding (in part) to the presentations we saw last week and the presentations we will have this week. Christensen and Bower (1996), and Henderson and Clark (1990) are classics from the tech strategy literature, addressing why incumbent firms struggle to survive periods of disruptive technological change. Jacobides, MacDuffie and Tae (2016), in contrast, examine why automakers have successfully maintained a dominant position in the automotive supply chain over a long period of time.

In preparation for this class, please send me an email by Thursday 7pm containing 5 talking points for class on Friday. These may be comments, questions, issues you want to resolve etc.

Cheers,
David.

Announced on 16 April 2018  10:41  a.m. by David R. Keith

No Homework This Week

Hi all,

Good news - there will be no 15.879 homework this week. We will spend this week's class hearing presentations from 3 students, workshopping research ideas with them where helpful. I encourage you to use this homework time to progress your own term papers.

See you on Friday.

Cheers,
David.

Announced on 09 April 2018  11:34  p.m. by David R. Keith