The Antitrust Analysis of Multi-Sided Platform Businesses

No outside funding was received or relied on for this paper. David Evans works for a large number of companies that are multi-sided platforms for whom he provides consulting on antitrust related issues. Many of these relationships are confidential; the public ones include Google and Visa. Evans is Chairman, Global Economics Group; Lecturer, University of Chicago Law School; Executive Director, Jevons Institute for Competition Law and Economics and Visiting Professor, University College London. Schmalensee is Howard W. Johnson Professor of Economics and Management, Emeritus, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. We would like to thank Howard Chang and Steven Joyce for valuable assistance and helpful comments. We are indebted to Marshall Van Alstyne, Mark Armstrong, Yong Chao, Glen Weyl, and the editors for useful comments on an earlier draft. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research.