Triopoly

An informal way to refer to a market dominated by three players.

The online advertising industry was previously known as a Duopoly (see also: Duopoly). Sometime in the late or 2010s, Amazon was added as the third member to the exclusive club. eMarketer has projected Amazon’s share of US digital advertising spending will rise from 7.6% in 2019 to 8.6% in 2020. That may not be much, but the market is a large one. Think of how many websites there are, yet 70% of digital advertising spending goes to three properties.

I would have preferred the term “Tripoly.” The ad industry is so confusing that people might as well not know if one is referring to three corporate behemoths or the capital of Libya.