Dynamic control of a multiproduct monopolist firm’s product and process innovation

Abstract

In this paper, we develop a dynamic control model of a multiproduct monopolist’s product and process innovation with knowledge accumulation resulting from learning by doing. Our work main features have four aspects: (i) the multiproduct monopolist’s instantaneous cost functions of product and process innovation depend on both the corresponding investments and the accumulations of knowledge through learning by doing in product and process innovation activities, respectively; (ii) the change rates of knowledge accumulations of product and process innovation are state variables; (iii) product innovation is understood as a reduction in product substitutability and process innovation as a lowering of marginal production cost; and (iv) monopolist’s inverse demand function depends jointly on the output level for product varieties and product substitutability. Our main objective is to investigate the optimal decision behavior of a multiproduct monopolist investing in product and process innovation with knowledge accumulation resulting from learning by doing under the monopolist optimum and social planner optimum. Our results show that: (i) there exists a unique saddle stable steady-state equilibrium under the monopolist optimum and social planner optimum, respectively; (ii) the learning rates of product and process innovation affect the monopolist’s investments in product and process innovation under the monopolist optimum and social planner optimum; and (iii) both investments in product and process innovation are lower under the monopolist optimum than that under the social planner optimum. Our results are valuable complements and development to the results drawn from the standard product and process innovation model.

Keywords:

• Knowledge accumulation
• learning by doing
• product innovation
• process innovation

Acknowledgements

The author thanks the anonymous referees and the associate editor for their careful reading and their comments on the first version of this paper.

Notes

Please note this paper has been re-typeset by Taylor & Francis from the manuscript originally provided to the previous publisher.