Systems and Methods for Dynamic Pricing and Auction Adjudication During Online Auctions

摘要

An electronic auction system hosting an auction includes a pricing and an adjudication application. The pricing application adjusts an opening price of an auction item to be less than a reserve price in response to buyer interest factors. The adjudication application receives bids on the item and automatically evaluates a reserve price and, when determining the reserve price is too high, adjusts the reserve price to an adjusted reserve price when a highest bid is less than the reserve price. When the adjusted reserve price is equal to or less than the highest bid the adjudication application automatically awards the item to a high bidder. When the adjusted reserve price is greater than the highest bid the adjudication application automatically sends an electronic message to the high bidder to inform that the reserve price has been adjusted and to inform of their status as high bidder.