Abstracts
Résumé
Face au problème de circularité auquel sont confrontées toutes les plateformes bifaces lors de leurs lancements, la littérature académique recommande généralement aux entrepreneurs d’adopter une stratégie d’amorçage en deux temps : acquérir d’abord des clients sur l’un des côtés du marché pour recruter ensuite leurs contreparties de l’autre côté du marché. L’objectif du présent article consiste à démontrer que cette pratique d’amorçage séquentiel peut se révéler sous-optimale. Nous proposons en effet aux détenteurs de plateformes une autre méthode, parfois plus efficiente, capable de réduire significativement leurs coûts d’acquisition clients en début d’activité. Notre démonstration se fonde sur un modèle heuristique et l’application du « paradoxe des anniversaires » aux préoccupations des plateformes bifaces.
Mots-clés :
- Plateformes bifaces,
- Amorçage,
- Paradoxe des anniversaires,
- Start-up
Abstract
When two-sided platforms start their business, they face a “circularity problem”. To overcome this problem, the academic literature often advises entrepreneurs to adopt a two-stage strategy. First they are supposed to acquire clients on one side of the market. Then, they have to recruit the counterparts of these clients on the other side of the market. The aim of this article is to show that this sequential launch strategy can be sub-optimal. We propose a more efficient method which can sometimes significantly reduce the early customer acquisition costs of platform owners. Our demonstration is based on a heuristic model and the application of the “birthday paradox” to the concerns of two-sided platforms.
Keywords:
- Two-sided platforms,
- Launch strategy,
- Birthday paradox,
- Start-up
Appendices
Références
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