In economics, market concentration is a function of the number of firms and their respective shares of the total production (alternatively, total capacity or total reserves) in a market. In any industry, a handful of firms that hold a significant portion of the market share and likely engage in the practice of consolidation will indicate higher market concentration within that industry. The market concentration ratio measures the concentration of the top firms in the market, this can be through various metrics such as sales, employment numbers, active users or other relevant indicators. In theory and in practice, market concentration is closely associated with market competitiveness, and therefore is important to various antitrust agencies when considering proposed mergers and other regulatory issues. Market concentration is important in determining firm market power in setting prices and quantities. Market concentration is affected through various forces, including barriers to entry and existing competition. Market concentration ratios also allows users to more accurately determine the type of market structure they are observing, from a perfect competitive, to a monopolistic, monopoly or oligopolistic market structure. Market concentration is related to industrial concentration, which concerns the distribution of production within an industry, as opposed to a market. In industrial organization, market concentration may be used as a measure of competition, theorized to be positively related to the rate of profit in the industry, for example in the work of Joe S. Bain. An alternative economic interpretation is that market concentration is a criterion that can be used to rank order various distributions of firms' shares of the total production (alternatively, total capacity or total reserves) in a market. Factors affecting Market Concentration There are various factors that affect the concentration of specific markets which include; barriers to entry(high start-up costs, high economies of scale, brand loyalty), industry size and age, product differentiation and current advertising levels. There are also firm specific factors affecting market concentration, including: research and development levels, and the human capital requirements. Although fewer competitors doesn't always indicate high market concentration, it can be a strong indicator of the market structure and power allocation. Metrics After determining the relevant market and firms, through defining the product and geographical parameters, various metrics can be employed to determine the market concentration. This can be quantified using the SSNIP test. A simple measure of market concentration is to calculate 1/N where N is the number of firms