Carl Shapiro

Senior Consultant to CRA
Carl Shapiro | Antitrust and Competition | Charles River Associates

Carl Shapiro is the Transamerica Professor of Business Strategy in the Haas School of Business at the University of California at Berkeley.

Shapiro had the honor of serving as a Member of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers during 2011-12. For the two years immediately prior to that, he was the Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Economics at the Antitrust Division of the US Department of Justice; he also held that position during 1995-96. From 1998 to 2008, Shapiro served as Director of the Institute of Business and Economic Research at UC Berkeley. He has been Editor and Co-Editor of the Journal of Economic Perspectives and a Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, among other honors. Shapiro earned his PhD in Economics at M.I.T. in 1981, taught at Princeton University during the 1980s, and has been on the Berkeley faculty since 1990.

Shapiro has published extensively in the areas of industrial organization, competition policy, patents, the economics of innovation, and competitive strategy. His current research interests include competition policy, the economics of innovation, the design and use of patents, housing finance, and energy and environmental economics.

Shapiro is the co-author, with Hal R. Varian, of Information Rules: A Strategic Guide to the Network Economy, published by the Harvard Business School Press. Information Rules has received critical acclaim for its application of economic principles to the Information Economy and has been widely read by managers and adopted for classroom use.

Selected engagements

  • 01
    Court upholds divestiture in consummated merger challenge
    When JELD-WEN and CraftMaster merged in 2012, Steves & Sons claimed the merger would restrict the supply of doorskins and increase prices to downstream...
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  • 02
    General Electric acquires Alstom's power and grid business
    CRA economists advised counsel to General Electric on the acquisition of Alstom’s power and grid business. The $13.5 billion deal was reviewed by the US...
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  • 03
    CRA economists advise FTC on its successful challenge to Staples/Office Depot merger
    CRA economists supported the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) throughout its review of the proposed $6.3 billion merger of Staples and Office Depot. CRA...
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Credentials