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This paper presents a novel approach for designing and optimizing maintenance service contracts through the application of mechanism design theory. When offering a contract to its customer, the maintenance service provider seeks to specify contract terms – such as price, service features and incentives – that maximize the provider's profit, satisfy customer needs, allocate risks effectively and mitigate moral hazards. Optimal contract design has to account for asymmetric information and uncertainties associated with customer characteristics and behaviors. We illustrate our mechanism design approach by applying it to the contract design challenge of a gas turbine manufacturer, which also provides maintenance services for its aircraft engines. In our solution approach, we compute an optimal set of contracts. The entire set is presented to the customer and is designed such that the customer will accept one of the contract alternatives without negotiations. In addition to eliminating the costs and delays associated with negotiations, this approach also reveals the customer's private information to the service provider, which the provider can use to its benefit in maintenance management and future contract renewals. Furthermore, we design and incorporate win–win incentive mechanisms into the contracts, which reward the customer for actions that reduce maintenance costs. We present a deterministic and a stochastic mechanism design model, the latter accounting for uncertainties associated with customer actions, engine performance, and maintenance costs during the contract execution phase. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although previous research has provided insights into the direct effects of platform decentralization governance on market value, scholars have failed to theorize and empirically examine the mediating mechanisms through which platform decentralization governance transfers into increased or decreased market value. This article draws on signaling (Spence, 1973) and mechanism design theory (Hurwicz, 1973) to provide a theoretical understanding of how voluntary disclosures and developers' activities mediate the relationship between platform decentralization and market value. We test our model with a sample of 682 largest market capitalization blockchain platforms. The results confirm our proposed mediation relationships that (1) centralization (or low decentralization) governance enhances platform market value via more voluntary disclosures, (2) decentralization enhances platform market value via facilitating developers' activities, and (3) centralization enhances market value via more voluntary disclosures that in turn facilitate developers' activities. Overall, our study offers both theoretical and practical implications regarding the governance structures that drive value for digital and blockchain platforms. • We study the platform decentralization and market value relationship via the lens of signaling and mechanism design theory • We test our model with a sample of 682 largest market capitalization blockchain platforms • Voluntary social media disclosures and developers' activities mediate the decentralization and market value relationship [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]