Competition Between Digitals Platforms and With Non-platform Business: on the Example of Taxi Services

The work is devoted to the competition between digital platforms and traditional business on the example of taxi services. The topic is interesting because over the past 6 years, prices for taxi services have fallen, and prices for gasoline have increased. It remains unclear whether this price drop is due to competition between multiple digital platforms, adjacent digital platforms (like carsharing), or competition between traditional taxi companies and digital aggregators. In this paper, we conducted a quantitative analysis of various types of competition. For the study, we used prices for taxi services in Russian cities and regions for the period from January 2014 to February 2021, as well as variables reflecting the competition between digital aggregators themselves, between digital aggregators, and traditional taxis. The analysis was carried out using the difference of differences method. Based on the analysis, it was found out that the following factors influenced the prices of taxi services: car sharing (which acts as an alternative to taxi service), competition between various digital aggregates (Yandex.Taxi, Vezet, Maxim), and competition with traditional businesses (which do not have digital platform technologies)