Optimal competitive auctions

We study the design of truthful auctions for selling identical items in unlimited supply (e.g., digital goods) to n unit demand buyers. This classic problem stands out from profit-maximizing auction design literature as it requires no probabilistic assumptions on buyers' valuations and employs the framework of competitive analysis. Our objective is to optimize the worst-case performance of an auction, measured by the ratio between a given benchmark and revenue generated by the auction.

Authors

• Ning Chen 0005
• Nikolai Gravin
• Pinyan Lu

Keywords

• competitive analysis
• mechanism design
• auction
• digital goods