The Digital Economy: Economics, Antitrust and Regulation

COURSE CONVENOR:

Dr. David S. Evans, Co-Director, Jevons Institute for Competition Law and Economics, and Visiting Professor, University College London

Organised by 

• Jevons Institute for Competition Law and Economics; and the
• UCL Centre for Law, Economics & Society

Timings: Registration from 1pm, course starts at 1.30pm and ends at 6.30pm.

Faculty:

• Dr. David S. Evans, UCL and Global Economics Group
• Mr. Henri Piffaut, Vice-President, French Competition Authority
• Dr. Yves-Alexandre de Montjoye, Assistant Professor, Imperial College London and Special Adviser to Commissioner Vestager

About the course:

The digital economy has grown vast and now reaches almost every aspect of our lives. Whether as consumer, business, or regulator we interact with Internet-based businesses constantly. It is also undergoing a massive transformation, with accompanying disruption, as the PC-web-browser centric ecosystem shifts to a mobile-app-centric ecosystem. That transformation has resulted in the “sharing economy,” the “gig-economy”, and the “app-economy” to use some of phrases that dominate today’s conversations.

The digital economy, and in particular digital platforms, are now the subject of numerous sectoral inquiries around the globe, active investigations, and significant decided cases. These range from the Commission’s decisions in several Google cases, to the Facebook privacy and data decision by the Bundeskartellamt, to the recent UK and Australian digital economy inquiries.

This course will provide an economic survey of the digital economy focusing on what’s unique and how the various pieces of the digital economy fit together. The relevant economic tools, such as multi-sided platforms, the economics of data, and bundling digital goods, will be discussed along the way. That will provide a backdrop for examining key competition policy issues that arise in cases, inquiries, and regulation. A particular focus of the course will involve applying the new economics of multisided platforms to the digital economy and examining the role of attention platforms.

The course will consist of three main topics:
1. Nuts and Bolts
a. Internet and World Wide Web
b. Fixed Broadband
c. Mobile Broadband from 2G to 5G
d. Software Platforms and Apps
e. APIs and Ecosystems
f. Big Data

2. Digital Platforms and Their Participants
a. Mobile Platforms, App Stores, and Apps
b. Online Attention Platforms
c. Online Retailers and Marketplaces
d. Gig and Sharing Platforms
e. Platforms as Regulators

3. Competition Policy, Consumer Protection, and Public Policy
a. Network Effects, Critical Mass, and Exclusionary Practices
b. Mergers, Innovation, and Platform Markets
c. Antitrust Economics of Free
d. Algorithms: Self-Preferencing, Rankings
e. Regulating Bad Behavior on Platforms and Negative Platform Externalities
f. Data: pooling, access, privacy

The course will draw extensively on examples of competition policy cases involving the digital economy from the EU, US, and China and these will be included in each segment.

Who should attend:

The course is mainly designed for professionals familiar with competition policy and sectoral regulation (lawyers, economists, and officials) but should also be informative for anyone who works for, invests in, must interact with digital economy businesses.

Detailed course timings:
13:00 Registration
13:30 Course begins
15:00 Break
15:10 Course continues
16:50 Break
17:00 Course continues
18:30 Course ends

Fees:

Standard Ticket = £220 (early bird until 21 May (£180)
UCL Alumni ticket = £150
Government Employee = £80
Students from other universities = £25

Book your place