Jo Seldeslachts

• University of Amsterdam

We study the role of alliance governance in the behavior of partners in alliances with different degrees of competition. Using data from a lab experiment on 1,009 alliances and 31,662 partners' choices, we explore whether and how alliances succeed in different competitive scenarios, contingent on the use of formal governance mechanisms (termination...

We investigate how R&D spillovers propagate across firms linked through Research Joint Ventures (RJVs). Building on the framework developed by Bloom et al. (2013) which considers the opposing effects of knowledge spillovers and product market rivalry, we extend the model to account for RJV cooperation. Since the firm’s decision to join a RJV is end...

We provide a description of ownership patterns in the top 25 European banks for the period 2003–2015, where we especially focus on the global financial crisis. Investment managers, such as Blackrock, are dominant in terms of number of blockholdings in different banks, maintaining fairly stable “common ownership” networks throughout our sample. Howe...

We present an ex-post analysis of the effects of GDF’s acquisition of Suez in 2006, which created one of the world’s largest energy companies. We perform a series of econometric analyses on the market for trading at the Zeebrugge gas hub in Belgium. Removing barriers to entry and facilitating access to the hub through ownership unbundling were an i...

We investigate patterns in common ownership networks between firms that are active in the U.S. pharmaceutical industry for the period 2004–2014. Our main findings are that “brand firms”—that is, firms that have research and development capabilities and launch new drugs—exhibit relatively dense common ownership networks with each other that further...

We investigate the impact of competition policy enforcement on the functioning of European energy markets while accounting for sectoral regulation. For this purpose, we compile a novel dataset on the European Commission’s (EC) and EU member states’ competition policy decisions in energy markets and combine it with firm- and sector-level data. We fi...

Declines in productivity growth substantially explain new‐normal business stagnation; yet in order to address situations of slack productivity growth, firms can choose from six generic transformational strategies: retirement, renewal, retrenchment, replication, redeployment, and recombination. While the extant literature focuses on specific transfo...

Does enforcement action by the Netherlands Competition Authority (NMa) in the case of cartels and mergers produce an anticipatory effect? We use surveys among firms and their advisers to test whether merger plans that may fail to gain clearance from the NMa are not notified and whether the possibility of detection helps to reduce the number of cart...

The European Commission (EC) has long intended to play a leadership role in setting a pan-European competition policy; yet, both centralized and decentralized tendencies have been manifest in the European context for competition policy. It is not clear the whether these leadership intentions translate into actual leadership by the EC. We shed light...

We estimate the deterrence effects of U.S. merger policy instruments with respect to the composition and frequency of future merger notifications. Data from the Annual Reports by the U.S. DOJ and FTC allow industry based measures over the 1986-1999 period of the conditional probabilities for eliciting investigations, challenges, prohibitions, court...

In our paper, the target of a proposed merger, by setting a reserve price, is able to screen prospective acquirers according to their (expected) ability to generate merger-specific synergies. Both empirical evidence and many merger models suggest that the difference between high and low-synergy mergers becomes smaller during booms. Thus, a target's...

This paper tests whether upstream R&D cooperation leads to downstream collusion. We consider an oligopolistic setting where firms enter in research joint ventures (RJVs) to lower production costs or coordinate on collusion in the product market. We show that a sufficient condition for identifying collusive behavior is a decline in the market share...

In this paper we analyze bidding behavior of law firms competing for routine cases in a procurement auction. The auction rules allow for several fee arrangements including hourly rates and fixed fees. We observe lawyers bidding several fee arrangements in contrast with both the "usual" hourly rates and our theoretical finding that bidding unravels...

The aim of this paper is to empirically test the determinants of Research Joint Ventures’ (RJVs) group dynamics. We develop a model based on learning and transaction cost theories, which represent the benefits and costs of RJV participation, respectively. According to our framework, firms at each period in time weigh the benefits against the costs...

The change from analogue to digital technologies in the mobile telecom industries at the beginning of the 1990s increased the economic rationale for rendering these markets more competitive. Yet, the speed of reforms have been remarkably different across countries. We empirically investigate this cross-sectional and temporal variation in entry libe...

We show that the number of merger proposals (frequency-based deterrence) is a more appropriate indicator of underlying changes in merger policy than the relative anti-competitiveness of merger proposals (composition-based deterrence). This has strong implications for the empirical analysis of the deterrence effects of merger policy enforcement, and...

Antitrust policy involves not just the regulation of anticompetitive behavior but also an important deterrence effect. Neither scholars nor policy makers have fully researched the deterrence effects of merger policy tools because they have been unable to empirically measure these effects. We consider the ability of different antitrust actions-block...

We estimate the deterrence effects of U.S. merger policy instruments with respect to the composition and frequency of future merger notifications. Data from the Annual Reports by the U.S. DOJ and FTC allow industry based measures over the 1986-1999 period of the conditional probabilities for eliciting an investigation, challenge, and prohibition: d...

We estimate the deterrence effects of U.S. merger policy tools with respect to the composition of future merger notifications. Data from the Annual Reports by the U.S. DOJ and FTC allow industry based measures over the 1986-1999 period of the conditional probabilities for detection (eliciting an investigation), punishment (eliciting an antitrust ac...

Though there is a body of theoretical literature on research joint venture (RJV) participation facilitating collusion, empirical tests are rare. Even more so, there are few empirical tests on the general theme of collusion. This note tries to fill this gap by assuming a correspondence between the stability of research joint ventures and collusion....

Though there is a body of theoretical literature on research joint venture RJV) participation facilitating collusion, empirical tests are rare. Even more so, there are few empirical tests on the general theme of collusion. This note tries to fill this gap by assuming a correspondence between the stability of research joint ventures and collusion. B...

Deregulation typically comes with redistribution of rents and thus with opposition from the losing interest groups. We show that, by exploiting complementarities, synchronising deregulation across markets makes this opposition lower. Indeed, a particular deregulation may reduce rents for one interest group, but may result in gains for another inter...

The aim of this paper is to test the determinants of Research Joint Ventures’ (RJVs) group dynamics. We look at entry, exit and turbulence in RJVs that have been set up under the US National Cooperative Research Act, which allows for certain antitrust exemptions in order to stimulate firms to cooperate in R&D. Accounting for unobserved project char...

We analyse the effects of investment decisions and firms' internal organisation on the efficiency and stability of horizontal mergers. In our framework efficiency gains are endogenous and there might be internal conflict within merged firms. We show that, both with and without conflict, stable mergers often do not generate efficiency gains. In the...

Antitrust policy involves not just the regulation of anti-competitive behavior, but also an important deterrence effect. Neither scholars nor policymakers have fully researched the deterrence effects of merger policy tools, as they have been unable to empirically measure these effects. We consider the ability of different antitrust actions – Prohib...

Antitrust policy involves not just the regulation of anti-competitive behavior, but also an important deterrence effect. Neither scholars nor policymakers have fully researched the deterrence effects of merger policy tools, as they have been unable to empirically measure these effects. We consider the ability of different antitrust actions - Prohib...

Merger activity is intense during economic booms and subdued during recessions. This paper provides a non-financial explanation for this observable pattern. We construct a model in which the target-by setting the takeover price-screens the acquirer on his (expected) ability to realize synergy gains when merging. In an economic boom, it is less prof...

This paper proposes an explanation as to why some mergers fail, based on the interaction between the pre- and post-merger processes. We argue that failure may stem from informational asymmetries arising from the pre-merger period, and problems of cooperation and coordination within recently merged firms. We show that a partner may optimally agree t...

We analyse the effects of investment decisions and firms’ internal organisation on the efficiency and stability of horizontal mergers. In our framework synergies are endogenous and there might be internal conflict within merged firms. We show that often stable mergers do not lead to more efficiency and may even lead to efficiency losses. These merg...

We analyse the effects of investment decisions and firms' internal organisation on the efficiency and stability of horizontal mergers. In our framework economies of scale are endogenous and there might be internal conflict within merged firms. We show that often stable mergers do not lead to more e.ciency and may even lead to efficiency losses. The...

This study analyzes the effects of right-wing extremism on the well-being of immigrants based on data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) for the years 1984 to 2006 merged with state-level information on election outcomes. The results show that the life satisfaction of immigrants is significantly reduced if right-wing extremism in the nativ...

Dit artikel is een eerste studie die voor Vlaanderen nagaat wat de relatie is tussen technologische ontwikkeling en jobcreatie en -destructie door gebruik te maken van micro-economische gegevens, op het niveau van de onderneming. Specifiek wordt bestudeerd wat de bijdrage is van technologische innovatie tot het scheppen en vernietigen van banen. In...