Fast-fashion brands are often accused of copying the designs of high-end fashion brands, thereby reducing the distinctiveness of high-end brands and eroding their brand equity. HKUST’s Zijun (June) Shi and colleagues propose a novel way to investigate whether and how fast-fashion copycats affect high-end brand equity. Despite the enormous size of the fashion ... Read More

In online retail marketplaces, consumers learn more about products through reviews or ratings, which can then increase their willingness to buy. HKUST’s Zijun (June) Shi and colleagues assess the optimal level of information disclosure in these reputation systems, which can reduce the information asymmetry between sellers and consumers. As the researchers ... Read More

Is green coffee bean extract a miracle cure for obesity? Are raspberry ketones or saffron extract magic weight loss ingredients? Regardless of the veracity of these claims, the celebrity physician Dr. Mehmet Oz has endorsed those and many products to the viewers of The Dr. Oz Show. This has created “the Oz effect” of increased interest—and may perhaps have ... Read More

Is green coffee bean extract a miracle cure for obesity? Are raspberry ketones or saffron extract magic weight loss ingredients? Regardless of the veracity of these claims, the celebrity physician Dr. Mehmet Oz has endorsed those and many products to the viewers of The Dr. Oz Show. This has created “the Oz effect” of increased interest—and may perhaps have ... Read More

Despite its immense popularity, the freemium business model remains a complex strategy to master and often a topic of heated debate. In this research, we ask when and why a firm should offer a zero price on its low-end product when users’ product usages generate network effects on each other. Without network effects, freemium never emerges as optimal, and the ... Read More

‘Freemium’, a pricing strategy whereby a firm offers a basic product or service at no cost to the user, has attracted considerable attention in recent years. Having led to the rapid rise of companies such as Skype and Dropbox, countless startups have also adopted freemium as their business model. After all, there are obvious reasons why freemium is ... Read More