A true duopoly (from Greek duo δύο (two) + polein πωλεῖν (to sell)) is a specific type of oligopoly where only two producers exist in one market. In reality, this definition is generally used where only two firms have dominant control over a market. In the field of industrial organization, it is the most commonly studied form of oligopoly due to its simplicity.

Duopoly models in economics[link]

There are two principal duopoly models, Cournot duopoly and Bertrand duopoly:

• The Cournot model, which shows that two firms assume each other's output and treat this as a fixed amount, and produce in their own firm according to this.

• The Bertrand model, in which, in a game of two firms, each one of them will assume that the other will not change prices in response to its price cuts. When both firms use this logic, they will reach a Nash equilibrium.

Politics[link]

Modern American politics has been described as a duopoly since the Republican and Democratic parties have dominated and framed policy debate as well as the public discourse on matters of national concern for about a century and a half. Third Parties have encountered various blocks in getting onto ballots at different levels of government as well as other electoral obstacles, more so in recent decades.

See List of political parties in the United States for a more comprehensive look at the politics of the Two-party system, Duverger's law.

Examples in business[link]

The most commonly cited duopoly is that between Visa and Mastercard, who between them control a large proportion of the electronic payment processing market. In 2000 they were the defendants in a US Department of Justice antitrust lawsuit.^[1][2] An appeal was upheld in 2004.^[3]

Examples where two companies control a large proportion of a market are:

This unreferenced section requires citations to ensure verifiability.

• Moody's and S&P in the Ratings market
• Pepsi and Coca-Cola in the soft drink market
• Gillette and Wilkinson Sword/Schick in the razor blade market
• Airbus and Boeing in the commercial large jet aircraft market
• Marvel Comics and DC Comics in the comic books market
• Intel and AMD in the consumer desktop computer microprocessor market
• The local cable company and the local telephone company in residential broadband Internet access
• Analogue mobile phone service (1983–2008) assigned bandwidth for just two carriers (A/B); in much of North America these effectively were "Alternate" and "Bell" (or the incumbent regional telephone landline monopoly in the area). Windsor-Detroit was very adversely affected^{[citation needed]} by this spectrum allocation limitation.
• The Home Depot and Lowes in the American retail home improvement market.
• Kodak and Fujifilm in motion picture film stock and color 135 film markets
• K-Kauppa and S-Group in the Finnish supermarket market (jointly they control 75% of supermarket market)
• Foodstuffs and Progressive Enterprises in the New Zealand supermarket market (jointly they control 90% of supermarket market)
• Woolworths and Coles in the Australian supermarket market (share 79% of the supermarket market)^[4]
• Nvidia and the ATI subsidiary of Advanced Micro Devices in the mainstream graphics card market.
• LexisNexis and Westlaw in legal research; the two companies together have been jokingly referred to as Wexis
• PetroChina and Sinopec in Chinese oil production.
• Pakistan State Oil and Shell Pakistan in white oil products in Pakistan (share almost 90% of the white oil market in the country)
• Rai and Mediaset in the Italian television market.
• Telstra and Optus in the Australian telecommunications market.
• Dish Network and DirecTV in the U.S. satellite provider market.
• Televisa and Azteca in the Mexican multimedia market. (jointly they control 95% of the multimedia market)
• Handango and Motricity in mobile content retailing market.
• Migros and Coop in Swiss retail food market.
• FedEx and UPS in the United States express small package delivery industry.
• MillerCoors and Anheuser-Busch in the United States domestic beer market.
• Canon and Nikon in high end imaging optics, film and digital cameras (especially in DSLRs)
• Kleenex and Puffs in facial tissues.
• RTM and Media Prima in Malaysia's free-to-air television station market.
• Starhub and Singtel in Singapore's cable television market.
• SMRT Corporation and SBS Transit in Singapore's transport system.
• Verizon and AT&T in the U.S. telecommunications market.
• GeoEye and DigitalGlobe in the U.S. satellite imaging market.
• Mitre 10 MEGA and Bunnings Warehouse in the Australian and New Zealand retail/trade timber and hardware market (Share 85% of the timber and hardware market).^[5]
• Leitner-Poma and Doppelmayr CTEC in the chairlift industry.
• Google's Android and Apple's iOS in the mobile operating system market.

Media[link]

In Finland, the state-owned broadcasting company Yleisradio and the private broadcaster Mainos-TV had a legal duopoly (in the economists' sense of the word) from the 1950s to 1993. No other broadcasters were allowed. Mainos-TV operated by leasing air time from Yleisradio, broadcasting in reserved blocks between Yleisradio's own programming on its two channels. This was a unique phenomenon in the world. Between 1986 and 1992 there was an independent third channel but it was jointly owned by Yle and MTV; only in 1993 did MTV get its own channel. Safaricom mobile service provider and Zain in Kenya are perfect examples of Duopoly market in African telecommunication industry.

Broadcasting[link]

Duopoly is also used in the United States broadcast television and radio industry to refer to a single company owning two outlets in the same city.

This usage is technically incompatible with the normal definition of the word and leads to confusion, inasmuch as there are generally more than two owners of broadcast television stations in markets with broadcast duopolies. In Canada, this definition is therefore more commonly called a "twinstick".

Board games[link]

The board game Monopoly Junior is sometimes referred to as "Duopoly".^{[citation needed]}

See also[link]

• Monopoly

References[link]

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (March 2011)

It has been suggested that Sawiris Family be merged into this article or section. (Discuss) Proposed since April 2010.

Naguib Sawiris
Born	June 15, 1954
Nationality	Egyptian
Net worth	$2.5 billion (US$)
Religion	Christian, of the Coptic Orthodox Church

Naguib Onsi Sawiris (or Sawires, Egyptian Arabic: نجيب انسى ساويرس, IPA: [næˈɡiːb ˈʔonsi sæˈwiːɾɪs] or [sæˈwiːɾes]; born June 15, 1954) is an Egyptian businessman and politician. He was executive chairman of the telecommunications companies Wind Telecom and Orascom Telecom Holding (OTH) before turning to politics in May 2011.^[1] OTH launched the first mobile operator in Egypt, Mobinil in 1998.

OTH has 20,000 employees and manages 11 GSM operators around the globe. In the beginning, OTH’s strategy was to target underpenetrated high population markets. However, soon after it started to pursue more developed markets with the launch of Wind Mobile by its Globalive subsidiary in Canada in December 2009. Moreover, OTH launched the first mobile operator in North Korea in 2008, “Koryolink”.

Background[link]

Sawiris joined Orascom in 1979. The Orascom Group is the country’s largest private sector employer and has the largest market capitalization on the Cairo & Alexandria Stock Exchange. Sawiris established and built the railway, information technology, and telecommunications sectors of Orascom. The conglomerate was later split into separate operating companies: Orascom Telecom (OT), Orascom Construction Industries (OCI), Orascom Hotels & Development and Orascom Technology Systems (OTS). OTH was established in late 1997 and since then has been chaired by Sawiris.

Wind Telecom S.p.A.[link]

In early 2005, Sawiris founded Weather Investments (later called Wind Telecom) and led the leveraged buyout of a majority stake of Wind Telecommunications in Italy, taking over as its chairman. A year later, he led Weather Investments' acquisition of Tim Hellas in Greece and re-branded it Wind Hellas. In November 2006, Wind Telecommunications floated the largest ever PIK debt in Europe and used the proceeds to complete the buyout of Wind from ENEL, resulting in the Sawiris Family owning 98% of Weather.

In October, 2010, VimpelCom Ltd., Russia’s second-largest mobile phone operator, and Sawiris agreed to merge their phone assets in a transaction valued at about US$6.5 billion. Sawiris announced his plan for a new company with the companies not included in the merger: the Egyptian mobile-services company, Mobinil, the North Korean GSM operator, Koryolink, Mena Cables, and non-GSM companies.^[2][3] In January 2011, the company changed its name from "Weather Investments S.p.A." to "Wind Telecom S.p.A.".^{[citation needed]}

Associations[link]

At international and regional levels, Naguib Sawiris serves on the following Boards, Committees and Councils:

• Member of the international advisory committee to the NYSE Board of Directors (IAC) since November 2005
• Board member of the International Advisory Board to the National Bank of Kuwait
• President of the German-Arab Chamber of Industry and Commerce for 2008–2009
• Board member of the Supreme Council of Sciences and Technology formed by a presidential decree issued by the former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. The council's board includes Nobel laureate Dr Ahmed Zewail, Dr Farouq el-Baz and Sir Magdy Yaqoub.
• Co-chair, the Egyptian Italian Business Council
• Board member on both the Board of Trustees and the board of Directors of the Arab Thought Foundation
• Board of Trustees member of the French University in Cairo
• Board member of the Egyptian Council for Foreign Affairs
• Board member of the Consumer Rights Protection Association of Egypt
• Chairman of the Board of Endeavor

Political involvements[link]

He is considered a nationalist and supporter of liberalism. He favored a gradual transition during the 2011 Egyptian revolution and played as a mediating figure between the protesters and Hosni Mubarak's people. Although he expressed concerns about the military caretaker government^[4] he favored changes that increased democracy and stability.^[5] He is the founder of the liberal Free Egyptians Party.^[6][7] In 2009, Sawiris launched the Arabic-language ONTV television network, which has adopted a politically liberal stance and, in addition to its popular Ramadan serials, hosts two of the most-watched talk shows in Egypt.^[8]

Political difficulties[link]

In late June 2011, his tweet of Mickey Mouse with an Islamic beard and dressed in a Jilbāb and Minnie Mouse wearing a full Muslim veil caused controversy, accusing him of racism and Islamophobia.^[9][10][11] Sawiris' tweet of Mickey and Minnie Mouse in salafi garb led to calls for a boycott of the various businesses in which he has invested, including Mobinil and the Al-Masry Al-Youm newspaper. ^[12]

Awards and recognitions[link]

Naguib Sawiris is the recipient of numerous honorary degrees, industry awards and civic honors, including the French Legion of Honour and the Sitara-e-Quaid-e-Azam award, conferred upon him in 2006 by Pervez Musharraf “for services rendered to the people of Pakistan in the field of telecommunication, investments and social sector work.” In November 2011, the Canadian International Council recognized him as the 2011 CIC Globalist of the Year.^[13]

Education[link]

Naguib Sawiris holds a Diplom (similar to a Master's) in Business Administration and Mechanical Engineering from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH), Zurich, Switzerland and the Abitur (diploma) from the German Protestant School, Cairo, Egypt.

Personal life[link]

Naguib Sawiris is the eldest of three brothers. His brothers are Nassef Sawiris and Samih Sawiris. He is the son of Onsi Sawiris who established the Orascom Group.

In 2010, Naguib Sawiris was listed in Forbes magazine as the 374th richest person in the world, with a personal wealth of US$2.5 billion.^[14]

Sawiris is an Egyptian Christian, following the teachings of the Coptic Orthodox Church.

References[link]

External links[link]

• Sawiris profile at Orascom telecom website
• Naguib Sawiris on Charlie Rose

Global Goon's Jonathan Hawk is a former programmer from Lydiate who earned a recording contract with Rephlex Records^[1] before moving to London and being Richard D. James' (aka Aphex Twin)'s housemate. He had been making electronic music using SoundEdit 16 while supporting himself with various programming jobs. After moving into a shared house with James, Tom Jenkinson, Chris Jeffs and Grant Wilson-Claridge, he released his first album Goon on Rephlex in 1996. Rumors that Goon actually was an alias for Aphex Twin persisted even after the release of Cradle of History two years later. After releasing Vatican Nitez four years later, he left the Rephlex label and started his own label J-HOK records, which he released 3 albums on.^[2] He also released one album on Audio Dregs, and two albums and one EP on WéMè.^[3] Global Goon has also released 5 acid records under the alias Syntheme on both Planet Mu and WéMè between 2007 & 2009.

Music critics have characterized Global Goon's style as ambient music and as "easy listening fusion".^[4] From Bessemer Cocktail and after, his music took a turn towards acid house rather than the easy listening downtempo.

Discography[link]

Albums

EPs and Singles

References[link]

External links[link]

• Global Goon Official Site at J-Hok.com
• Discography at Discogs
• Syntheme at Discogs

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