Manley R. Irwin

US telecommunications regulation: Will technology decide?

Twenty years ago, the telecommunications industry was an established regulated monopoly. But improvements in technology and reductions in costs have ripped apart the premises of natural monopoly and the economic rationale for public utility regulation. The authors review past US telecommunications policy and question the assumptions of the current search for a policy for the future. They believe that, for the industry to develop, institutions and restraints need to be removed.

Corporate networks, privatization and state sovereignty: Pending issues for the 1990s?☆

Since the 1980s the growing importance of the corporate network has raised sensitive policy issues in telecommunications relating to privatization and national sovereignty. This paper explores these issues in relation to the corporate network and analyses the existing problems and those that will arise in the next decade. The authors examine the corporate network, its workings, its importance as a competitive strategy, especially in a global context, and explain how this causes policy tensions. The authors suggest that these tensions will not dissipate over time, but that they will continue to affect policy-making well into the 1990s.

Technology changes market boundaries

Abstract In the future, the microelectronics driven coalescence of product features and the blurring of market boundaries will lead to growing competition from products and technologies outside the firms traditional realm of competitors. Further, this “Blindside Competition” can be expected to grow both in scope and impact during the 1980s. Nonetheless, firms which are able to identify the nature of blindside threats can reposition themselves to exploit the ever growing array of market opportunities created by technology. In this article, we identify the forces of microelectronics which are driving blindside competition, and suggest that as a result, adjustments in market orientation will be required.

Confessions of a Telephone Regulator: The FCC's AT&T Investigation of 1972–1977

A quarter of a century has elapsed since the Federal Communications Commission launched a massive investigation of the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T). In this study, known as Docket 19129, the Commission sought to determine whether the Bell operating companies (BOCs) were paying too much for equipment purchased from AT&Ts supply affiliate, Western Electric. Stated as a question, did AT&Ts integration of telephone service and telephone manufacturing benefit the telephone rate payer? AT&Ts ownership of telephone service and equipment manufacturing was hardly a recent development in U.S. telecommunications. Western Electric had been a part of the Bell system since the early 1880s. Despite some one hundred years of supply ownership, the policy questions attending Bells vertical relationship kept recurring over time. In 1 934, for example, the very first inquiry by the newly created Federal Communications Commission was none other than AT&Ts ownership of Western Electric. The Commissions examination of Westerns prices and costs ran through most of the 1930s and drew to a close as war clouds gathered over Europe. By 1939, the FCC essentially opted for AT&Ts structural status quo. The FCCs intention to revisit AT&Ts integration in 1972 was thus not an action without precedent. To a certain extent, the Commission backed into the Western Electric problem. Initially, the FCC sought to determine whether the price of long distance service was reasonable and prudent. That question inevitably triggered another. How could the FCC justify telephone rates without some knowledge of equipment costs? Equipment costs led the commission to look into Western Electric prices. The billing of equipment to the Bell operating companies constituted an internal corporate transaction. Did those transactions redound to the benefit of the telephone user?

Markets without boundaries

Western economies, and the US in particular, are experiencing a dramatic diversification and proliferation of information activities which will effect all aspects of leisure and business. Against this background, Manley Irwin considers the nature of market entry, the reasons why markets are changing so rapidly, and the implications for both public and private sectors. He concludes that the blurring of market boundaries will defuse and decentralize economies, spur competition and encourage entrepreneurial activity.

A Note on Public Sector Integration: The Decline of British Naval Aviation, 1914–1945

Economists have traditionally confined their study of mergers to the economys private sector. Over the years a body of knowledge has contributed to our understanding of corporate buyouts and acquisitions. But what about the public sector? Can an industrial organization framework tell us anything about the performance of a public enterprise once amalgamated? This note suggests that industrial organization can offer some insight into government mergers. Our case study focuses on Great Britains treatment of its naval aviation unit, the Royal Naval Air Service. The time, 1914 to 1945, covers naval aviations evolution from the First through the Second World War. Specifically, Britains aviation consolidation played a pivotal role in arresting the Royal Navys once heralded lead in naval aviation.

US telecommunications : Searching for the optimum policy

Divestiture, deregulation and market entry have not removed the burden of choice in US telecommunications policy. This report analyses the context in which the USA is struggling to strike a balance between regulation and global competition, and discusses the future prospects for regulation in the light of the emerging globalization.

The telecommunications equipment market: public policy and the 1970's

The growing interdependence of computers and communications, generally identified with developments in digital transmission and remote data processing services, has not only broadened the market potential for telecommunication equipment but has posed several important public policy issues as well. It is the purpose of this paper to explore the relationship between the telecommunications equipment market and U.S. telecommunication policy. To this end we will first survey the traditional pattern of supplying hardware and equipment within the communications common carrier industry and second, identify recent challenges to that industrys conduct and practices. We will conclude that public policy holds a key variable in promoting competitive access to the telecommunication equipment market---access that will redound to the benefit of equipment suppliers, communication carriers, and ultimately the general public.