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Peter Lotz

Associate Professor

Subjects
Business development Managerial economics Disruption Innovation Industries Mergers and acquisitions Technology

Primary research areas

Industry competition and development

Industries develop over time as companies compete on price and costs. Innovations change the products and the ways they are produced. Under the pressure to exploit scale economies, companies die, grow or merge. New industries branch out as companies shed activities in which they are not competitive. I am studying these developments as an ongoing process.

Cities as loci for industry development

Over the history, cities have been the main venue for economic development. Trade and production are concentrated in cities. Cities bring together critical resources and as the size of cities grow, companies may achieve new economies of scale and specialization. This leads to a concentration of economics activities I cities. I am studying how the spells out in Denmark.

My study of competition and innovation in industries provides a platform for better understanding current developments like increased monopolization and the growth of the big cities

My research interest is founded on a deep curiosity for how business activities are changing society from within. The individual company and the specific industry may seem as unique but when millions of companies compete in thousands of industries driven by the same basic forces, societies will change.

 

Researchers like Smith, Marx, Marshall and Schumpeter each have provided crucial perspectives on these developments, and I am studying selected, actual situations for the general public to better understand and maneuver in an ever-changing world.

My current work pertains to growth of the largest cities in Denmark, at the expense of the country-side and the smaller cities. I argue that more and more companies need to locate in large cities in order to exploit various economies of scale, especially the access to a large and diversified labor market.

This process creates serious regional imbalances which, unless understood and accepted, may cause deep political problems.