Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Reverse Auction Bidding'

Many people still confused and misunderstand the differences between auction types: In fact, we have only two major types of auctions which are the forward auction and Reverse auction[22]. In a forward auction a single seller offers an item for sale with many competitive buyers driving the price upward: In a Reverse Auction, a single buyer wants to purchase a service or an item from many sellers, they drive the price downward: There are many differences between these type of auction: Including the progress of the auctions; winner selection criterion and other factors: The Reverse Auction nowadays is one of the most preferred types of online auctions: It gains popularity rapidly because of representing the buyers' side and helps him to drive prices down in contrary with the forward auction or traditional auction. The aim of this study is to identify the most common types of the Reverse auctions and compare them to one another to determine when should be used by a buyer and propose the most efficient implementation model for some types: The results of this study are: achieve a written report and a small demonstrator model on how to implement English Auction and Second-Sealed bid Auction.

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The transparency subject in which Brazilian Public Administration is concerned, has been more and more debated as well as developed. And the portal ComprasNET has been part of it. Most of the 60 billion reais spent in investments and in different expenses, 22 billion were realized by means of ComprasNET in the reverse auction model. This dissertation main purpose is to analyse price variation concerning a single item, in this case the A4 75gr paper. And also check statistically whether there is any price variation among the several reverse auctions made by the Federal Public Administration. In case of positive answer, this work main purpose is to identify the administrative procedures which may have caused such discrepancies. After this study, suggestions will be presented to change those administrative procedures as well as to reduce the amount paid in such reverse auctions. The recommendations will not only be based on the available legislation but also on decisions and agreements made by TCU, AGU and many other departments of the Federal Public Administration. So finally, this work will try to make it clear to our society, to show it how the tax paid by its citizens has been spent.
O tema transparência na administração pública Brasileira esta cada vez mais em foco e o portal de compras ComprasNET faz parte dos portais de transparência do Governo Federal. Em 2011, dos quase 60 bilhões de reais gastos em investimentos e despesas diversas, 22 bilhões foram realizados por meio do ComprasNET na modalidade pregão eletrônico. Esta dissertação visa analisar a variabilidade de preços para um item específico de material, no caso o papel A4 75 gr, verificando estatisticamente se existe variabilidade de preços nas diversas licitações realizadas pelos órgãos da Administração Pública Federal. Em caso afirmativo, o trabalho visa identificar os procedimentos administrativos que podem ter causado tal divergência. A partir daí, foram apresentadas sugestões para alteração desses procedimentos administrativos, visando a redução do valor pago nos pregões eletrônicos. As recomendações foram baseadas na legislação em vigor e em decisões e acórdãos do TCU, AGU e demais órgãos da Administração Pública Federal. Dessa forma, este trabalho vai de encontro aos anseios da sociedade em ter uma melhor aplicação dos recursos públicos arrecadados por meio de impostos e taxas pagos pela população.

Thesis (M.Eng.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems Division, 2000.
Includes bibliographical references (leaves 48-51).
The Information Era has brought along a myriad of revolutionary changes. The Internet in particular has given new forms to old paradigms. It is quite a challenge for companies to decide which of all these options best suit their business model and their strategies, hopefully one that also provides them with a competitive edge. One of these new alternatives is online auctions used as a procurement tool. And because of their novelty, it is still unclear whether they are a flawless method of decreasing costs. Although there are many issues concerning this topic, the one addressed here is how the bidders' behavior during the auction (the strategy used to place their bids) affects the outcome, for them as well as for the company setting up the event; and how managers on both sides can maximize the benefits. The basis for the study was a recent auction conducted by autoparts maker Visteon for the procurement of a plastic hose. On the supplier side, the results show that those companies that had a target price before entering the auction, would obtain the most benefits (less sacrifice in profits), since Visteon did not award the projects solely based on price. On the buyer side, having a rich mixture of bidders (diverse in size, location, quality concern for example) enables a more dynamic process (lower prices).
by Michel Galland Lopez.
M.Eng.

This thesis concerns the interdisciplinary field of combinatorial auctions, combining the fields of computer science, optimization and economics. A combinatorial auction is an auction where many items are sold simultaneously and where bidders may submit indivisible combinatorial bids on groups of items. It is commonly believed that good solutions to the allocation problem can be achieved by allowing combinatorial bidding. Determining who wins in a combinatorial auction is fundamentally different from a traditional single-item auction because we are faced with a hard and potentially intractable optimization problem. Also, unless we are limited to truthful mechanisms, game theoretic analysis of the strategic behavior of bidders is still an open problem. We have chosen primarily to study the first-price combinatorial auction, a natural auction widely used in practice. Theoretical analysis of this type of auction is difficult and little has been done previously. In this thesis we investigate and discuss three fundamental questions with significant practical implications for combinatorial auctions. First, because the number of possible bids grows exponentially with the number of items, limitations on the number of bids are typically required. This gives rise to a problem since bidders are unlikely to choose the "correct" bids that make up the globally optimal solution. We provide evidence that an expressive and compact bidding language can be more important than finding the optimal solution. Second, given a first-price (sealed-bid) combinatorial auction, the question of equilibrium bidding strategies remains an open problem. We propose a heuristic for finding such strategies and also present feasible strategies. And finally, is a first-price combinatorial auction worth pursuing compared to the simpler simultaneous (single-item) auction? We prove, through a model capturing many fundamental properties of multiple items scenarios with synergies, that the first-price combinatorial auction produces higher revenue than simultaneous single-item auctions. We provide bounds on revenue, given a significantly more general model, in contrast to previous work.

Thesis (Ph.D)--Management, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2008.
Committee Chair: Wu, D.J.; Committee Member: Keskinocak, Pinar; Committee Member: Narasimhan, Sridhar; Committee Member: Toktay, Beril; Committee Member: Zhang, Han.

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This dissertation shows that the bidding issue can be used as a regional development public policy instrument. The biddings in the state of São Paulo are based on a public policy that requires procedures of territorial decentralization. The decree that regulates this policy is focused mainly on giving a favored and simplified treatment to micro and small businesses. On the issue of decentralization the São Paulo government presents innovation in relation to federal legislation dealing with the subject. The decentralization phenomenon can contribute to increase the amount of winning companies that belong to particular region where the biddings producing 'regional economic growth'. However, here we adopt the hypothesis that this differential has not been effective. To verify it, we conducted a case study focused on two units of the University of São Paulo, both located in countryside. Analyzed the presence and electronic (reverse auctions) bidding procedures. The comparative analysis was still supplemented by a questionnaire given to civil servants of the procurement area of various units of this University. The result obtained in this paper shows that the effect of promoting regional development has not been achieved in both cases studied. It concludes that we must go a long way in the discussion about the use of governmental purchasing power as a potential inducer of regional development, which invariably suffers from legal changes. It’s also necessary to adopt complementary public policies.
Esta dissertação aborda a questão das licitações e como elas podem ser usadas como instrumento de política pública de desenvolvimento regional. As licitações do estado de São Paulo são orientadas sob uma política pública que exige procedimentos licitatórios que considerem a descentralização territorial. O decreto que regulamenta tal política tem como principal enfoque o tratamento simplificado e favorecido a micro e pequenas empresas, sendo que o aspecto da descentralização inova em relação à legislação federal que aborda o assunto. O fenômeno descentralizador pode contribuir para o aumento da quantidade de empresas vencedoras pertencentes a uma determinada região na qual ocorrem às licitações, podendo desta forma produzir 'crescimento econômico regional'. Contudo, adota-se aqui a hipótese de que esse diferencial não tem surtido efeito. Para verificar tal hipótese, realizou-se um estudo de caso centrado em duas unidades da Universidade de São Paulo, ambas localizadas no interior do estado. Foram analisadas as licitações realizadas de maneira presencial e eletrônica (pregões). A análise comparativa ainda foi complementada por um questionário submetido aos servidores da área de licitação das diversas unidades desta Universidade. O resultado obtido neste trabalho indica que o efeito de promoção do desenvolvimento regional não ocorreu em ambos os casos estudados. Conclui-se, ainda, que é preciso avançar muito na discussão acerca da utilização do poder de compra do Estado como potencial indutor de desenvolvimento regional. Esta atuação estatal invariavelmente deverá sofrer mudanças legais, sendo necessária, também, a adoção de outras políticas públicas complementares.

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The thesis analyses political change in public procurement policy of Brazilian federal administration describing in a systematic way the six cases in which legal rules and procedures suffered substantial changes affecting general laws or statutes: the centralization of purchases in Vargas period, in two decisive moments (1931 and 1940); the revision of rules for bidding by Decree-law 200, in the context of president Castello Branco administrative reform; the enactment of a statute for biddings (Decree-law 2.300 ) in José Sarney government; the congressional approval of a general bidding law directed to fight corruption and collusion in public contracts (Law 8.666, of 1993 ); the frustrated attempt of a new bidding law aligned with the managerial public management reform of Fernando Henrique Cardoso government and the creation of reverse auction (pregão) as a new modality for bids, in 2000. The research focuses the political process of problem formulation, specification of solutions and decision-making, applying John Kingdon`s model to unfold the flows of political process, problems and solutions in each specific historical context. The six cases are described and compared by means of structured narratives and their analysis is supported on theoretical model categories to elucidate how the process of change is developed and which are the relevant actors, ideas, models and political events that explain their circumstances and result.
A tese analisa as mudanças da política de compras e contratações da administração pública federal brasileira descrevendo de forma sistemática os seis casos nos quais as regras e procedimentos sofrem alteração substancial, na forma de leis gerais ou estatutos: a centralização das compras no período Vargas, em dois momentos decisivos (1931 e 1940); a revisão das regras de licitação pelo Decreto-lei n. 200, no contexto da reforma administrativa do governo Castello Branco; a edição de um estatuto das licitações (o Decreto-lei n 2.300) no governo Sarney; a aprovação no Legislativo de uma lei de licitações voltada para o combate à corrupção e ao direcionamento dos contratos públicos (Lei 8.666); a tentativa frustrada de uma nova lei alinhada com a reforma gerencial do primeiro governo Fernando Henrique Cardoso e a criação do pregão como nova modalidade de licitação, em 2000. A pesquisa focaliza o processo político de formulação dos problemas, especificação de soluções e tomada de decisão, com base no modelo de John Kingdon, desdobrando a análise em fluxos do processo político, dos problemas emergentes e das soluções, em cada contexto histórico específico. Os seis casos são descritos por meio de narrativas estruturadas e comparados a partir das categorias do modelo teórico para elucidar como se desenvolveu o processo de mudança, quais os atores relevantes, idéias, modelos e eventos políticos que explicam suas circunstâncias e resultado.

Reverse Auction Bidding is a recently developed auction method. In this form of bidding process, the roles of the bidders and the owner are interchanged in terms of the form of the economic transaction. The owner's objective is to drive the unit rates down and the bidder's objective is to maintain an acceptable profit level. A study into Reverse Auction Bidding commenced at Texas A&M University in 2004 and continues to this time, with this the eighteenth study in the series. This study is the second multi-group study in the research. In this study, a multiple group comparison was made between different numbers of bidders, with Games One, Two and Three having three, four and ten bidders respectively. All participants were faculty and students from the Department of Construction Science. The critical requirement for the participants is that they should have no prior experience using the Reverse Auction Bidding system. The eighteen studies have concentrated on new players, with future studies planned for repeat participants. A number of the recent case studies have shown personality has an impact on the performance of the bidders. However, this work was not controlled for personality, as the research objective was to determine the impact of a different number of bidders in a game. The Keirsey Temperament Sorter test was completed by all participants so that the results could be understood in terms of personality impact on the level of return to each participant. The results showed the number of bidders has a significant impact on the individual returns confirming the earlier work on varying the number of bidders. An increase in the number of bidders was shown to lead to a more competitive economic environment, which given usual economic circumstances lead to a reduction in the number of firms interested in bidding, for the self-evident economic reasons. This work points to the need to investigate a bidding group size of five or six, which is likely to be the self-constrained upper limit in a real economic system. Some interesting observations on the personality types suggest that further work is required in this area.

Reverse Auction Bidding (RAB) is a recently developed procurement method that can be used by the construction industry. The technique is different from a traditional auction system, since RAB system uses a bidding activity method that is completed anonymously by pre-qualified bidders during a fixed auction time. The basic premise for the auction is that the current best auction price is available for viewing during the whole auction process by both bidders and owner. The apparent incentive is for noncompetitive bidders to lower the price. There are however controlling factor beyond the reach of owners, such as market demand, lending restrictions, stakeholder expectations and risk tolerance levels, that impact on price levels. However, owners continue to attempt to drive down prices using this technique. A study into the mechanics of RAB was launched at Texas A&M University in 2004. This ongoing study of RAB continues to this time with eighteen case studies. This nineteenth study looks at the time series bid data from some of the prior work. Nine case studies were selected from the previous case studies. These nine studies provided untainted data with 6674 RAB bid arrivals by prior investigator actions. This study concerns the statistical process of bid arrivals with time. The hypothesis to be tested is that the RAB bid arrivals timing can be modeled with a statistical process. The analysis reviewed the fit for several types of distribution, including Gaussian and Poissionian. The best fit was modeled by non-homogeneous Poisson process (NHPP). The first conclusion from the analysis is that RAB bid arrivals follows a Poisson process, termed non-homogeneous Poisson process (NHPP). The second conclusion is that the controlling Poissionian process has a square root factor. The NHPP model for RAB provides a tool for future studies of RAB in real time. Future work is suggested on the inter-time periods for the bidding.

The advancement of computer technology is playing an important role in almost all fields in the construction industry in the current era. It has become a tool for exchanging legal contract information, including bid data. In the traditional closed bidding system, the bidders were unaware of their competitors' bid quotes and had no opportunity available to make a counter an offer to the bid at a different level. However, in reverse auction bidding (RAB), contractors can track their competitors' bids and take the given opportunity to re-bid the projects at lower rates. Unlike traditional auctions, where buyers raise their purchasing prices to outbid competitors, reverse auctions permit buyers to purchase goods and services from suppliers who are encouraged to sell them at the lowest price. The benefit of the reverse auction bidding is either that the vendors are able to re-bid, or lower their bid multiple times. This is an example of transparent economic information. Van Vleet initiated the ongoing Reverse Auction Bidding study at Texas A&M University. Van Vleet had created a Microsoft Access database system and ASP web based user interface for RAB study. The methodology developed by van Vleet is still being used today, and this study has been extended into analyzing different personality types and the impact on the bidding system. In the previous studies conducted by different researchers in TAMU, the performance of participants in the RAB process along with their behavior are being observed with respect to their personality. Personality of each player is tested using the Keirsey Temperament Sorter (KTS) test. The previous study states that there appears to be a strong correlation between personality type and game performance. The first case study conducted by van Vleet involved five participants who had no prior experience in Reverse Auction Bidding. The number of participants has varied from three to ten participants. This research has been conducted on graduate students of the Construction Science Department of TAMU who have no prior experience in RAB. In continuation with the previous studies held in TAMU, the results show that there is an observable pattern in the bidding strategy of first time bidders while taking part in Reverse Auction Bidding.

Participating in an auction and winning items by placing bids has been in practice since at least 500 B.C. Auctions have evolved since then and anyone can now participate in one online and buy items ranging from clothes, electronics, automobiles and homes using online auction websites, such as eBay. A Reverse Auction varies from the traditional style of Auction where items or services are won by placing successive higher bids until the auction ends. The study of Reverse Auction was first introduced to Texas A & M University in 2004 and continues today, using a SQL based web system. This current research provides a detailed statistical analysis of the fourth case study in this long running work. This fourth case study involved the participation of five bidders who had no prior experience in Reverse Auctions. A Microsoft Access database system and ASP web based user interface was developed and used to conduct these initial studies. However, due to the limited capability of the Access system to handle more than a limited number of connections or bidders, a Microsoft SQL database and web system was developed in 2006 and has been used in all subsequent studies. Case studies have involved up to ten participants. The results from the fourth case study show that a Reverse Auction can result in an increase in the average cost of the job to the owner. Also, there is evidence of game play amongst the bidders and against the purchaser that causes their profits to rise as they gain proficiency in the game. This behavior has been termed as 'tacit collision', but it is considered a byproduct of the system and not illegal behavior. This study analyzes the fourth study data to investigate if the behavior termed "tacit collusion" is evident in the bidding data. This analysis is completed by performing a detailed statistical analysis of the bidding data. Analysis of the profit percentages illustrates the different stages of the game play amongst the bidders. This game play behavior is illustrated by plotting average number of bids to the profit made by each bidder. The data clearly suggests that the players became efficient in their bidding strategy, although some bidders are more efficient than others. This observation negates the common conception that Reverse Auctions will result in lowering average costs for the owners. The individual data of bidders for bids and profit reveal why some players were able to obtain higher than average results and why the others were not. This study can be taken further by analyzing the patterns of the successful and unsuccessful players to determine what causes them to gain or lose profits.

Reverse auction bidding is an online auction system. A purchaser's primary objective in using a reverse auction is to obtain the lowest possible bid for goods and services on a construction project. With this type of bidding, it is normal that the purchaser will only consider price, instead of a bidders' work history and experience. As a reverse auction is an online service, the common misperception is that a purchaser can reach a broader market to obtain the lowest possible price. It is a controversial bidding system. No previous research has been undertaken by the Texas A&M University Reverse Auction Bidding study group into potential owner interference with the bidding system for a reverse auction. Six bidders were asked to participate in the Reverse Auction Bidding process for a series of construction projects in Houston. Each participant was also asked to complete a Keirsey Temperament Sorter Test type I and II to determine each participant's personality. After the tests, the six participants competed in an online reverse auction bidding game. The primary objective of this research is to analyze the impact of an owner's interference in a reverse auction bidding scenario. In this test, one of the six bidders acted as the owner's surrogate to interfere with an ethical process and reduce the owner's costs. The other five bidders were unaware of the surrogate's role in the bidding. The primary directive given to the surrogate bidder was to drive down the cost of the projects. The results for the research study show that the owner's surrogate can affect the bidding process. Interference results in reduced returns for the bidders when compared to an uncompromised bidding scenario. It is clear that the method used is unethical.

It was in 2004 that the first case study was done by on the ongoing Reverse Auction Bidding at Texas A&M University. This long-term study has developed from a single case study, completed by van Vleet, to a series of case studies, now combined with personality testing of all participants. van Vleet developed a Microsoft Access database system and Active Server Pages web based user interface for the study. The first case study involved five participants with no prior experience in Reverse Auction Bidding. A study with five participants is considered competitive in accordance with the standard economic Herfindahl Index. van Vleet, concluded that the results showed a level of co-operation in the bidding game between the nominal competitors. In 2010 John Nichols coined the term "tacit collusion" to identify this apparent behavioural pattern observed in the bidding. A significant element of the studies from 2005 to 2009 has been to investigate the "tacit collusion" behaviour. Tacit collusion is not considered an illegal economic behaviour. In 2006 Seth Gregory encountered significant problems with a study involving ten participants using the Access database, as a result of Access' limitations on the number of connections. Gregory's study was migrated to a Microsoft SQL database that was developed by Wellington (2006) and which overcame the limitations. SQL database systems can generate a significant quantity of data which create a computer science problem, now commonly termed 'Data rich - analysis poor'. This study is the first in a series of studies to undertake a detailed statistical study of the early case studies to provide a set of algorithms for development of SQL queries for automated real-time data analysis of future Reverse Auction Bidding case studies. This study showed that a fifth order polynomial fit the contract time compared to the job number. Analysis of the number of bids per minute for the fifteen minutes of bid time showed a log-polynomial equation which provided a reasonable fit to the data. Two sub-games were postulated to describe the operational aspects of the auction. The first game, termed the - game, is between the players with the objective of maximizing average return and the second game, termed the - game, has the objective of average cost minimization for the purchasers and maximization of revenue for the seller group. In conclusion, Reverse Auction Bidding systems are not bid shopping, but the tenet that the purchaser will reduce costs in this type of system compared to the traditional closed bid system is not confirmed with van Vleet's data and any careful consideration of the results of canny players in the 'game suggests higher than average returns for some bidders. The results show a number of patterns in the data that warrant further study, particularly the characteristics of the canny players in the alpha game suggests higher than average returns for some bidders. The results show a number of patterns in the data that warrant further study, particularly the characteristics of the canny players.

Reverse Auction Bidding (RAB) study into the construction industry commenced at Texas AandM (TAMU) University in 2004 from the work of a graduate student who was interested in the reasons for RAB being considered unethical by some. This thesis is the eleventh study into Reverse Auction Bidding building on the work of the previous researchers. Previous case studies investigated a number of different competitive situations ranging from three to ten players. In the last few studies, the bidding behavior and performance of participants in the RAB process is being observed with respect to their personality. Personality for each player is tested using the Keirsey Temperament Sorter (KTS) test. The KTS describes four major personalities and four role variants in each of the personalities, summing up to sixteen role variants. There appears at this stage a strong correlation between personality type and game performance. This study extends the work on the Guardian personality type to investigate the four sub-types of this personality. This study builds on the previous work by analyzing the four different Guardian role variants being Provider, Protector, Inspector and Supervisor. The aim of the research is to investigate whether there is a difference in game returns between the personality type from within this group. The study involves a game scenario involving a facility manager hiring the contractors who submit the lowest bid for the assumed renovation project. The study also gives the contractor a modified KTS questionnaire that can be used by them for hiring an individual for the position of an estimator with a competent personality. The individuals were selected from undergraduate Construction Science students with limited experience. The game lasted for nine rounds, with the statistical results of the bidding and contract data showing patterns similar to the previous studies. The results show us that the individuals with a role variant of Providers provided the highest return in this case study, although a single case study is insufficient to draw formal conclusions on this matter, the result points to future research.

If a correlation exists between cost and project delivery system then this is crucial knowledge for any group organizing a new construction project. It has been observed anecdotally that the construction cost per student of public elementary schools has been observed to continue to increase in the state of Texas, even with the recent downturn in the economy. The recent economic depression in the USA has seen construction material costs stagnate and construction costs dropping. This is a direct result of the competitive nature of a market that has a lack of business. The issue of a rising cost at the time of a falling market is of more than a passing research interest to school superintendents and the people of Texas. This study investigated the relationship between cost and project delivery systems. A survey was sent to all school superintendents in Texas requesting recent data on elementary school enrollment, project delivery type and construction costs. One hundred and thirty six responses were received from one thousand and seventy six Texas school districts. A comparative means test was used to determine if a relationship exists between construction cost per student and project delivery system for public elementary schools in Texas. The research shows that Texas school districts are primarily using two types of project delivery systems for their new school construction, Construction Management at Risk and Competitive Sealed Proposals. After comparing the average construction cost per student for these two project delivery systems, the statistical analysis showed that Competitive Sealed Proposals cost approximately four thousand dollar less per student than Construction Management at Risk. The clear question is then as to why are districts using Construction Management at Risk when the comparative benefits of the contract type are not worth this amount of money per student.