Empirical Analysis of the Relationship between Technology and Product Choice

2017 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 15K03409
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Economic policy
• Research Institution: Hitotsubashi University
• Principal Investigator: Ohyama Atsushi 一橋大学, 大学院商学研究科, 准教授 (20598825)
• Research Collaborator: Braguinsky Serguey University of Maryland, Robert H. Smith School of Business
• Project Period (FY): 2015-04-01 – 2018-03-31
• Keywords: 製品選択 / 実証産業組織論

Outline of Final Research Achievements

The main purpose of this research is to examine the process through which firms form their competitiveness. In this research, firms' product choices are viewed as one of the important strategic decisions and demand factors and technology factors are incorporated into a unified framework to conduct empirical analysis. To overcome the difficulties past studies encountered, the database that contains the detailed information about demand and technology factors were constructed from the historical data on the Japanese cotton spinning industry. In contrast to the results from past studies, this research shows that, while the role of demand shock is rather minor, firms' resources such as engineers and supply network play critical roles in the determination of firms' product choices. This research also reveals that firms must overcome technological difficulties when they introduce vertically differentiated products, although there is sufficient demand for such products.

Free Research Field

産業組織論