Skip to main content

An English Auction Protocol for Multi-attribute Items

  • Conference paper
  • First Online:
Agent-Mediated Electronic Commerce IV. Designing Mechanisms and Systems (AMEC 2002)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNAI,volume 2531))

Included in the following conference series:

Abstract

In this paper, we suggest using an English Auction Protocol for a procurement multi-attribute auction in which the item for sale is defined by several attributes, the buyer agent is the auctioneer, and the seller agents are the bidders. Such domains include auctions on task allocation, services, or compound products. At the beginning of the auction the buyer agent announces the required properties of the item, and then various seller agents propose bids, which are composed of specific configurations that match its request. Each proposed bid should be better for the buyer agent than the previous bid, w.r.t. the announced requirements of the buyer agent. Finally, the last suggested bid will win, and the seller agent that suggested this bid will be committed to it. We consider two utility function models for the English auction protocols and provide the optimal bidding strategies for the seller agents and the optimal auction design for the buyer agents regarding both models.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

References

  1. Andersson, A. Tenhunen, M. and Ygge, F. Integer programming for combinatorial auction winner determination. In ICMAS-00, Boston, MA (2000) 39–46.

    Google Scholar 

  2. Bichler, M. An experimental analysis of multi-attribute auction. Decision Support Systems Vol. 29, 2000, p. 249–268.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Branco. F. The Design of Multidimensional Auctions. Rand Jurnal of Economics Vol. 28 N0. 1 Spring 1997, pp. 63–81.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Che, Y. K., Design competition through multidimensional auctions, RAND Journal of Economics, Vol. 24, (1993) 668–680.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Collins, J. Demir, G. and Gini, M. Bidtree Ordering in IDA* Combinatorial Auctionb Winner Determination with Side Constraints. Proceedings of AMEC-IV LNCS No. 2531 (2002).

    Google Scholar 

  6. Conen, W. and Sandholm, T. Differential-Revelation VCG Mechanisms for Combinatorial auctions, Proceedings of AMEC-IV LNCS No. 2531 (2002).

    Google Scholar 

  7. David, E., Azoulay-Schwartz, R., Kraus, S., Protocols and Strategies for Automated Multi-Attributes Auctions, in Proc. of the 1st conference on autonomous agents and multi-agent systems, Bologna, Italy (2002), to appear.

    Google Scholar 

  8. Gimenez-Funes, E., Godo, L., Rodriguez-Aguilar, J. A. and Garcia-Calves, P. Designing bidding strategies for trading agents in electronic auctions. In ICMAS-98, Paris, France (1998) 136–143.

    Google Scholar 

  9. Hudson, B. and Sandholm, T, Effectiveness of Preference Elicitation in Combinatorial Auctions., Proceedings of AMEC-IV LNCS No. 2531 (2002).

    Google Scholar 

  10. Nisan, N., Bidding and allocation in combinatorial auctions. In Proc. of the ACM Conference on Electronic Commerce (ACM-EC), Minneapolis, MN (2000) 1–12.

    Google Scholar 

  11. Parkes, D. C. Price-Based Information Certificates for Minimal-Revelation Combinatorial Auctions. Proceedings of AMEC-IV LNCS No. 2531 (2002).

    Google Scholar 

  12. Parkes, D. C., and Ungar, L. H. 2000b. Iterative combinatorial auctions: Theory and practice. In proc. AAAI-2000 (2000) 74–81.

    Google Scholar 

  13. Rosenschein, J., and Zlotkin, G. Rules of encounter: designing conventions for automated negotiation among computers. Cambridge, Mass. MIT Press. (1994)

    Google Scholar 

  14. Sandholm, T. W. Limitations of the Vickrey Auction in Computational Multiagent Systems. In proc. of ICMAS-96 (1996) 299–306.

    Google Scholar 

  15. Sandholm, T. W. An algorithm for optimal winner determination in combinatorial auctions. In IJCAI-99 (1999) 542–547.

    Google Scholar 

  16. Stone, P. Schapire, R. E. and Csirik, J. A. Attac-2001:A Learning Autonomous Bidding Agent. Proceedings of AMEC-IV LNCS No. 2531 (2002).

    Google Scholar 

  17. Walsh, W. E., Wellman, M. P., Wurman, P. R. and MacKie-Mason, J. K. Auction protocols for decentralized scheduling. In Proc. 18th International Conference on Distributed Computing Systems (1998).

    Google Scholar 

  18. Yoon, K. and C. Hwang. Multiple attribute decision making: an introduction. Thousand Oaks: Sage (1995).

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2002 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

About this paper

Cite this paper

David, E., Azoulay-Schwartz, R., Kraus, S. (2002). An English Auction Protocol for Multi-attribute Items. In: Padget, J., Shehory, O., Parkes, D., Sadeh, N., Walsh, W.E. (eds) Agent-Mediated Electronic Commerce IV. Designing Mechanisms and Systems. AMEC 2002. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 2531. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-36378-5_4

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-36378-5_4

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-00327-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-36378-1

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

Publish with us

Policies and ethics