Method for conducting a computerized auction

Abstract

The invention provides a method for conducting a computerized auction of property according to a tiered restriction process. The sale or transfer of the proper can be restricted as to the community a potential buyer must be a member of an specific attributes of the buyer. The buyer is only allowed to bid on those assets for which is community and attributes match those specified by the seller. Sellers, such as government agencies, may set up and defined their own asset profile codes comprising community groups, which permit the seller to restrict the sale of a particular asset to as large or small a community group as the seller desires and enables the government agency to accommodate any regulations or procedures that might be in place of a particular asset.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION [0001] The present application is a continuation of patent application Ser. No. 09 / 580,145, filed on May 30, 2000.FIELD OF THE INVENTION [0002] The present invention relates generally to a computerized method for conducting an auction, and in particular to a method for conducting an on-line auction of assets by government agencies over the Internet that allows for a tiered restriction process, and wherein the sale or transfer of an asset can be restricted to particular buyers that possess certain qualifications. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION [0003] Auctions provide a popular and exciting marketplace for the buying and selling of property. Recently, computerized auctions that take place over the Internet have become very popular. Such Internet auctions often include the sale of items ranging from sporting event tickets to fine art to stuffed animals. [0004] Such computerized and Internet auctions typically include the maintenance of a computer ser...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0013] The present invention is designed to overcome the shortcomings of the current method for conducting auctions, such as government auctions, by providing a computer based auction method that efficiently profiles potential buyers and screens the buyer's profiles against the restrictions for a particular asset to determine who are authorized buyers. Pursuant to a preferred embodiment of the method of the present invention, a provider company provides a computerized auction that takes into consideration the tiered restriction policies of an organization, such as government agencies. As discussed below, the method of the present invention affords sellers the flexibility to indicate any profile code desired for any particular asset. The present invention also minimizes the processing burden of the organization and maximizes potential revenue by using computerized auction capabilities.

[0015] In addition to the general organizational communities that are part of the present invention, sellers can set up and define their own community groups. This permits the government agencies to restrict the sale of a particular asset to as large or small a community as they desire. Using the method of the present invention makes it possible to efficiently accommodate any regulations or procedures that might be in place concerning the sale or distribution of government-held assets.

[0017] In addition to the community restriction and asset restriction process, the present invention also enables staged auction processing. As stated, local regulations and procedures often dictate that some organizations make assets available to other organizations in a sequential manner that provides preferred access to the asset to specified organizational communities. The present invention accommodates this requirement by facilitating the “staging” of an asset and moving it from one stage to the next based upon user-supplied parameters.

Problems solved by technology

Unlike the typical consumer auction, the transfer of property by government agencies through an auction often involves several considerations that, to date, have not been adequately addressed by the computerized auctions in place.

Further, the current method of conducting auctions of property by government agencies fails to address numerous problems, which are discussed below, and has resulted in inefficiencies that prevent the government agencies from obtaining the optimal price for its property and has increased the expense associated with the asset disposition process.

In addition to the community restrictions, these guidelines may also include asset restrictions, which may limit access to a particular asset to people with certain licenses or permits.

Previously, no method for efficiently profiling or screening potential purchasers to make certain they satisfy the restrictions designated by the sellers has been available in computerized auctions.

The existing government processes for checking that potential buyers satisfy each agency's restrictions, and for disposing of such excess, surplus, unclaimed, and confiscated property has been manual and paper intensive.

Such a manual and paper intensive process is highly inefficient and results in several problems.

Under the present method of disposing of assets by government agencies there is a very limited dissemination of information on available property.

Therefore, auctions for assets held by government agencies are often sparsely attended by potential buyers.

Government auctions to such a limited number of purchasers usually results in the property being sold for a much lower price than could be obtained if the auction was attended by a greater number of interested buyers.

One hurdle facing the efficient disposition of assets held by government agencies is matching eligible buyers with particular assets when they become available.

With the auctions for government-held property that were previously conducted, there was no automatic dissemination of information about available property to all or even a majority of potentially interested bidders.

Further, there did not exist an automatic means for determining which buyers were eligible to participate in an auction for a particular asset.

Moreover, the time required for processing the information for the potential bidders to determine whether the buyer satisfies the government restrictions can be lengthy and create a great deal of undue uncertainty for both buyer and seller.

The manual processing of the required information causes further delays in disposing of the property and thereby increases the inventory and storage costs.

The current auction methodology for government-held property also creates many inefficiencies for potential buyers.

For instance, sellers are not provided an easy means to notify potential buyers when items of particular interest are made available for auction.

Another problem with the current method is that in order to participate, interested buyers typically need to physically attend the various auctions.

This may cause problems and lost opportunities due to the geographical location of the auction relative to the potential buyer.

In situations where a buyer need not be present, the buyer is generally not provided with photographs of the property, and is therefore limited in his or her inspection of the property.

Potential bidders must also submit their personal information on numerous occasions to several separate government agencies, thereby creating unnecessary duplicative efforts as well as increasing the opportunities for error.

Moreover, because the various governments conduct auctions in non-standardized manners, potential buyers may believe that they are ineligible to participate in one auction because of the restrictions of a different governmental entity.

Therefore, potential buyers may miss out on opportunities to which they may have held an interest and for which they were eligible because of this mistaken belief.

This inability to efficiently process and disseminate information about the auctions results in a substantial loss of revenue to the government agency.

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