The mobile telecommunications industry is one of the most rapidly growing sectors around the world. This book offers a comprehensive economic analysis of the main determinants of growth in the industry. Harald Gruber demonstrates the importance of competitive entry and the setting of technological standards, both of which play a central role in their contribution to the fast diffusion of technology. Detailed country studies provide empirical evidence for the development of the main themes: the diffusion of mobile telecommunications services, the pricing policies in network industries, the role of entry barriers such as radio spectrum and spectrum allocation procedures. This research-based survey will appeal to a wide range of applied industrial economists within universities, government and the industry itself.

Contributing to a convergence of legal and economic approaches, The Economics of Antitrust and Regulation in Telecommunications integrates economic theory into current EU antitrust policy within the sector. The book addresses the role of competition and regulatory policies on a number of key issues in telecommunications, such as market definition, collective dominance, access to networks, and allocation of scarce resources.

Regulation is a public policy approach closely related to calculations of the equilibrium of supply and demand and to cost-benefit analyses. Governments combine a variety of incentives and restrictions on behavior, including laws and regulations, in order to guide enterprises and smaller entities within the economy toward pursuing policies in the public interest. This book offers an in-depth and systematic review of the economic theory of regulation, with particular emphasis on the Chinese context. The basic concepts cover economic and social regulation, regulatory process, regulation under asymmetric information, and capture theory. Drawing on a broad range of cases from across the telecommunications, electric power, and water sectors since the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, the author explores economic regulation in China with reference to natural monopoly, investment, price level and price structure, entry, and competition. In addition, he discusses theories of externalities and asymmetric information, which are analyzed in the light of China’s environmental and product quality regulation. The author argues that the Chinese government has deregulated its economy to a large extent in the past and proposes that the Chinese government will enforce more social regulation in the future. Students and scholars of government regulation, economics, and industrial organization will find this volume to be an essential guide.

"This book explores the value of information and its management by highlighting theoretical and empirical approaches in the economics of information systems, providing insight into how information systems can generate economic value for businesses and consumers"--Provided by publisher.

Tracks the evolution of the international cellular industry from the late 1970s to the present. The development of the mobile-phone industry into what we know today required remarkable cooperation between companies, governments, and industrial sectors. Companies developing cellular infrastructure, cellular devices, cellular network services, and eventually software and mobile semiconductors had to cooperate, not simply compete, with each other. In this global history of the mobile-phone industry, Daniel D. Garcia-Swartz and Martin Campbell-Kelly examine its development in the United States, Europe, Japan, and several emerging economies, including China and India. They present the evolution of mobile phones from the perspective of vendors of telephone equipment and network operators, users whose lives have been transformed by mobile phones, and governments that have fostered specific mobile-phone standards. Cellular covers the technical aspects of the cellphone, as well as its social and political impact. Beginning with the 1980s, the authors trace the development of closed (proprietary) and open (available to all) cellular standards, the impact of network effects as cellular adoption increased, major technological changes affecting mobile phone hardware, and the role of national governments in shaping the industry. The authors also consider the changing roles that cellular phones have played in the everyday lives of people around the world and the implications 5G technology may have for the future. Finally, they offer statistics on how quickly the cellular industry grew in different regions of the world and how firms competed in those various markets. Cellular is published in the History of Computing Series. This distinguished series has played a major role in defining scholarship in the history of computing. Hallmarks of the series are its technical detail and interpretation of primary source materials.

During the past decade, no industry has grown faster than that of mobile communications, yet coverage of its operations remains scarce. This state-of-the-art book examines the evolving structure and strategic behaviour of the thirty largest operators i

This handbook combines the perspectives of communication studies, economics and management, and psychology in order to provide a comprehensive economic view on personal and mass communication. It is divided into six parts that comprise: 1. an overarching introduction that defines the field and provides a brief overview of its history (1 chapter) 2. the most commonly used theoretic frameworks for the analysis of communication economics and management (4 chapters) 3. the peculiarities of the quantitative and qualitative methods and data used in the field (3 chapters) 4. key issues of the field such as the economics of language, labor in creative industries, media concentration, branding etc. (10 chapters) 5. descriptions of the development, trends and peculiarities of the field in different parts of the world, written by scholars from the respective region (10 chapters) 6. reflections on future directions for the field, both from a managerial and from an economics perspective (1 chapter). The authors of the individual chapters represent different academic disciplines, research traditions, and geographic backgrounds. The reader will thus gain multifaceted insights into the management and economics of communication.

. . . the authors have a pleasant approach to arranging and commenting on their facts, which makes the book readable. . . readers wanting quantitative data about mobile networks, on which qualitative theories can be based, will be very well satisfied. Robert Milne, Info The Journal of Policy, Regulation and Strategy for Telecommunications As a source of information on the mobile sector, the book is highly valuable. . . we should commend the authors for making a wealth of information accessible, and in my view, even for the most seasoned industry expert, the book will shed light on a dimension or aspect that has previously been overlooked or under valued. Wolter Lemstra, Competition and Regulation of Network Industries The Internationalisation of Mobile Telecommunications is a comprehensive look at the rapidly-changing market structure, the alternative technologies, the extent of globalization, and the ownership of firms in increasingly competitive mobile telecommunications markets around the world. This is an exceptionally valuable book for anyone interested in understanding current and future developments in mobile telecommunications. Stanford L. Levin, Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville, US Peter Curwen and Jason Whalley review the strategic operations of, and technological options available to, the 30 most prominent international mobile operators. This review is initially based upon the Asia-Pacific, African, European, Latin American and North American regions before moving on to take a worldwide perspective. The authors place these mobile operators within a wider business context via a broad ten-year appraisal of the companies involved in the entire telecommunications, media and technology (TMT) sector. The issue as to whether there truly is such a thing as a global mobile operator is addressed; the answer, in practice, is negative. Based upon the very latest data available, the underlying premise of the book is that mobile telecommunications is such a fast-moving sector that operators are obliged to alter their international strategies as circumstances unravel without necessarily having a long-term master plan, and hence that opportunism is a hallmark of operators international strategies. This state-of-the-art overview of the internationalisation of mobile telecommunications will prove essential reading for academics and practitioners with a vested interest in technology, telecommunications and strategic management.

"This book reviews different approaches and methodologies used in dealing with issues related to mobile ICTs, and presents successful examples mobile ICT adoption in developing countries, addressesing the impact of culture on mobile ICT adoption and deployment"--Provided by publisher.

Presents research into the economics of the digital society. This work offers an overview of the changes that information and communication technologies (ICTs) have brought about in our analysis and understanding of society, focusing upon welfare economics, networks, the diffusion of businesses and various forms of entrepreneurship, and more. This important new book presents a unique body of research into the economics of the digital society. It questions how modern economies have been transformed as a result of digital goods and markets, and explores the policy implications and challenges of this revolution. Luc Soete and Bas ter Weel have assembled leading economists and social scientists to provide an invaluable insight into the influence of the digital society in the core fields of economics. They offer a comprehensive overview of the changes that information and communication technologies (ICTs) have brought about in our analysis and understanding of society, focusing particularly upon welfare economics, networks, the diffusion of new businesses and new forms of entrepreneurship, the auctioning of licences, the much-debated role of intellectual property rights and the emergence of free software in the open-source movement