Market Definition Study Related To Advertising Based Platforms

The definition of relevant market is not only the key premise of analyzing competition behavior,but also an indispensable step in anti-monopoly law enforcement.At present,in our Internet anti-monopoly cases,the bigger influence cases define the relevant market.For example,"Renren v.Baidu","3Q War","Douyin v.Tencent","Food Pai Shi Abuse of market position","Alibaba two choices" and so on,only after the relevant market definition of these cases,the next stage of the analysis of whether the implementation of market dominance can be gradually clear,so as to lay the foundation for the trial of anti-monopoly cases.The content of this paper is mainly divided into four parts:The first part mainly expounds the definition and characteristics of the platform,divides the platform into three perspectives: intermediary platform,shopping mall platform and advertising platform,and analyzes the characteristics of the platform.Internet platform is widely believed by scholars at home and abroad to have three characteristics: cross network effect,user lock-in effect and price asymmetry,but these three characteristics are not shared by all types of platforms.The characteristics of different types of platforms should be analyzed on a case-to-case basis.Shopping mall platform and intermediary platform do not have cross network effect and price asymmetry.Shopping mall platform does not have user locking effect at the user end,but only has user locking effect at the merchant end Mediating platforms do not have user lock-in effect;Advertising platform has cross-price network effect and price asymmetry,but whether it has user locking effect still needs to be divided into social network platform,instant messaging platform and search engine platform to analyze and define respectively.The second part mainly expounds the challenges faced by the relevant market definition methods under the platform economy scenario.Firstly,it combs the traditional relevant market theories and relevant market definition methods,and then analyzes the difficulties faced by the traditional relevant market definition methods in combination with the characteristics of the Internet platform mentioned above.In the Internet platform economy,the characteristics of bilateral market and cross-border competition of platforms make the definition of relevant commodity markets an important premise.At the same time,in the context of cross-border competition,products and services provided by platforms are often diverse and complex.This also poses a challenge to the determination of benchmark products.At the same time,quantitative putative monopolist testing is also faced with difficulties,because the traditional SSNIP only considers unilateral market delineation,and the zero-pricing model makes the price variable based on the analysis of SSNIP lose significance.Finally,it is analyzed that the existence of multi-dimensional competition factors makes the role of price factors in defining relevant markets gradually weakened,while innovation factors,user attention factors and data factors play an important role in defining relevant markets,which are determined by the characteristics and status quo of Internet platforms.The third part mainly puts forward the corresponding improvement methods in view of the difficulties of market definition faced by the platform economy.Firstly,it analyzes some improvement methods proposed by domestic scholars and introduces the SSNIQ test method,which is similar to the analysis framework of SSNIP method.It only takes the quality to replace the price variable for testing,and discusses that in a reasonable period of time,The loss of users and the profit of operators when the operators slightly reduce the quality(25% up or down the quality),and then the profit model test method,which has some relevant research at home and abroad,mainly based on the profit model to define the relevant market,focusing on the source of the platform’s main profit.All of these approaches have their limitations and are still based on requirements substitution analysis in nature.The next is the exploration of the new path to define the platform-related market.In view of the problem of the blurred boundary of platform products,the benchmark products are determined based on supply.It is pointed out that the understanding of demand substitution analysis can be judged by the range of demand substitution choices of most consumers among commodities,and there is no need to be confined to every specific choice made by individual consumers.At the same time,a new idea is established to define the market based on the cross-network effect of different platforms.In view of the difficulty of defining the relevant regional market,this paper proposes to classify and define the market based on the nature of Internet platform products and the target customer groups.In addition,it is the presumed monopolist test and other market defining tools that fail in the platform economy scenario rather than the market defining theory.Finally,consider whether market definition is a necessary step or a review tool.The fourth part is an analysis of the classic case of defining the relevant market of the Internet platform,which focuses on the famous Qihoo v.Tencent case.It also illustrates the implications for China in the area of defining the relevant market for platforms.