Technology Standards: letting the consumer decide?

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Description

Enablers

  • Patents
  • Licensing
  • Competitive Advantage
  • Marketshare
  • Consumers

Inhibitors

  • Patents
  • Law Suits
  • Government regulations
  • Consumer acceptance
  • Competitors

Paradigms

On the one hand standards have there use, the make it easy for a lot of companies to produce the same products where the media can be interchanged by everyone. On the other hand companies rival each other till one standard becomes the winner or a combination is developed to incorporate in different devices.
In the game console industry standards are made with each new console. Interoperatibility is only possible with older models of one company's game console. Does the consumer really decide what standard a company should adopt? Not in a long shot, but standards are what make companies different from each other.

Experts

  • Stango, Victor (2004) The Economics of Standards Wars
  • Varian, Hal R. (1998) Standard wars

Timing

Web Resources