Combinatorial auctions: theory, experiments, and practice

Abstract

The proverb 'the longest mile is the last mile home' quite accurately describes my feelings at the end of this PhD journey. As usual at the end of your PhD, there is one thing left to do to complete the doctoral dissertation: writing the only part of this behemoth that people might actually readthe acknowledgements. Acknowledgements are usually quite non-consequential, in the sense that people are rarely evaluated on them (unlike, hopefully, the rest of this work), yet they do matter. Amidst the celebration, the right people require thanks in the right way. As is tradition, the first paragraph is dedicated to the advisor. Fun fact; while writing these acknowledgements, and going over how some of my predecessors handled it before me, I noticed that it is even tradition to mention that it is tradition to mention the advisor first. Fortunately, I had the privilege of having not just one, but two advisors. I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my advisors Prof. Dr. Frits Spieksma and Prof. Dr. Dries Goossens for the continuous support of my PhD study and related research, for their patience, motivation, and immense knowledge. Their door was-usually-open whenever I ran into a spot of trouble or had a question. Their guidance and attention to detail helped me bring iii v Van der Auweraer (check out the Nerf Super Soaker Zombie Strike Revenge Contaminator), Silvia Valeria Padilla Tinoco (pura vida!), and Sebastian 'speedy' Gonzalez, Finally, the newcomers: Heletje Van Staden, Laurens Deprez, and Kim De Boeck. It falls on you to keep the cake traditions alive! Phew, I really hope I did not forget anyone in that list.. . A lifelong friend obviously deserves mentioning. Tommy Graindourze, I like to think your philosophical ways kept me sane(r) during my PhD journey. The computer and board game distractions probably also helped. Finally, this last paragraph is dedicated to family. Special thanks go to my sister, her husband and their lovely daughter, my (first) godchild. I also want to express my deep gratitude to my parents. Both have instilled many admirable qualities in me, and have given me a solid foundation in life. They provided me with unfailing love, support and continuous encouragement throughout my years of study and the process of researching and writing this thesis. This accomplishment would not have been possible without them. The clichéd 'words cannot express' is fitting. Still, I will try: mom and dad, I profoundly thank you.

Using Feedback to Mitigate Coordination and Threshold Problems in Iterative Combinatorial Auctions

“…In order to validate whether the experimental settings indeed led to coordination and threshold problems, we make use of measures for both problems described in Vangerven (2017). The Coordination Index (CI) is a measure for the magnitude of the coordination problem, and basically looks at the total relative loss in economic efficiency if each bidder bids his/her true valuation on his/ her k most valuable packages, for k ranging from 1 to a value k max for which an efficient allocation is obtained.…”

Optimisation models for the procurement through reverse combinatorial auctions in the logistics and food industries

“…The aim of our study is to highlight the feasibility and advantages of designing and running internet-based markets for the e-procurement of multi-item goods or services. The considered market will use combinatorial auctions as a trading mechanism (Vangerven, 2017) rather than (or in parallel to) the traditional techniques based on tendering and negotiations. RCAs have shown to be very efficient in allocating several kind of resources in a wide range of industries.…”