This assignment is designed to develop skills in collecting and assessing market information and presenting clear written communication about how market structure affects the conduct and performance of firms in an industry.

Select one of the three oligopoly markets in Singapore:

1. Telecommunications

2. Supermarkets : I choose this

3. Ride-Hailing apps:

Your assignment should address the following questions:

1. How does the market structure (number of firms that compete in a market & relative size of the firms) affect the conduct or behavior of firms in your chosen industry (price markups & amount spent on advertising) and their performance (profits)?

2. Using one or more Oligopoly models (Sweezy, Cournot, Stackelberg, Bertrand), analyse how firms in your chosen industry make and respond to their competitors' output and pricing decisions.

3. What are the pricing strategies (2nd degree, 3rd degree, Versioning, Bundling, Tying) that firms in your chosen industry implement, and discuss how these strategies can enhance the firm's profits. You are required to collect market information (market share & pricing information) and use appropriate diagrams where necessary to support your analysis.

2. Suggested Essay Structure

1. Introduction - Thesis statement. Brief summary or outline of the main topics/arguments/points made in the essay.

2. Discuss the Structure-Conduct-Performance paradigm - how Market Structure (number of firms competing in an industry, relative size of firms (concentration), demand conditions (price elasticity of demand) and ease of firm exit or entry) of an industry affects the Conduct of firms (how individual firms behave in the market and involves pricing decisions and advertising decisions) and results in the firm's Performance (profits and social welfare).

3. Collect and present information - number of firms competing in the industry, the relative size of firms (market share) and identify the Market Structure of your chosen industry.

4. Collect and present pricing, advertising and profitability information of firms and compare and contrast how the Market Structure affects the Conduct and Performance of each firm in your chosen industry. Support your discussion with diagram(s).

5. Using one or more Oligopoly models (Sweezy, Cournot, Stackelberg, Bertrand), evaluate how firms in your chosen industry make output and pricing decisions and respond to their competitors' output and pricing decisions.

6. Discuss the objectives of Price Discrimination and capturing consumer surplus. Support your discussion with a diagram.

7. Collect and present pricing information that identifies at least two pricing strategies (second-degree discrimination, third-degree price discrimination, versioning, bundling, tying) implemented by firms in your chosen industry.

8. Analyse how the pricing strategies presented in point 7 can enhance the firm's profits. Quality over quantity for points 7 and 8. Discussing and analysing two pricing strategies in detail is better than discussing all pricing strategies superficially. Present 1 good pricing evidence for each pricing strategy is sufficient. This allows you to discuss in detail how the pricing strategy will make the firm higher total revenue, which translates to higher total profit if the cost structure is relatively fixed (Total Profit = Total Revenue - Total Cost). Support your discussion with diagram(s) where possible.

9. Based on all your analysis, do you see a transformation in how the firms compete in your chosen industry in the future and what that transformation could be?

10. Conclusion - Restatement or summary of the main points made in the body paragraphs. No new ideas are to be included in the conclusion. We do want to hear your opinions, based on sound reasoning and justifications on where the Singapore property market is going in the short and long run