Breaking Bottlenecks: Power distribution dynamics in industry evolution

Abstract

Many firms vie to attain a strategic bottleneck position in their industry, as it promises superior value appropriation over an extended period. Using a mixed-methods approach, we investigated the power dynamics between bottleneck and challenger segments in the airline ticket distribution sector. Our study of the bottleneck formed by the global distribution system (GDS) firms reveals the mechanisms that these firms employed to maintain power, as well as the mechanisms that airlines in the challenger segment used to attain power. These mechanisms strongly influenced the momentum of power shifts as the industry evolved towards greater modularization; we show how they worked recursively in a process of power distribution dynamics during that evolution. In addition, these mechanisms explain the dynamics at work between the incumbent and challenger segments, with airlines increasing the pressure to modularize and the GDS firms resisting that pressure. Our findings contribute to the literature on industry architectural change and industry evolution by providing a comprehensive understanding of the power dynamics that affect when and how strategic bottlenecks dissolve.