Auction System in Wireless Environment L.B. BHAJANTRI*, S. S. MANVI **, M. S. KAKKASAGERI**, S. S. NANDI* * ISE Dept, Basaveshwar Engineering College, Bagalkot-587102 **ECE Dept, Basaveshwar Engineering College, Bagalkot-587102 KARNATAKA - INDIA Abstract: - Pervasive and mobile computing technologies promise to provide users with a quick and convenient access to a variety of commercial applications. With the proliferation of mobile devices, such as laptops, mobile phones, Personal Digital Assistants (PDA), and the fast mobile networks, mobile auctions seems to be the most compelling service. This paper proposes an auction system in wireless environment to offer flexible and adaptable auction services to all users. We present a prototype implementation of an auctioning system in wireless environment by using mobile phones based on the English auction type. We elaborate on a prototypical process how these auction methods, interaction requirements and other attributes can be incorporated in mobile phones based auction. We observed that auction systems provide more flexible and adaptable commerce services to mobile users. Key- Words: - M-commerce, Auction, and WAP. 1 Introduction In general, mobile commerce (m-commerce) is defined as the use of wireless terminals (cellular telephone, personal digital assistant (PDA)) and a network to conduct business transactions, exchange of information, buying/selling of services or goods, etc. M-commerce has three unique characteristics: Convenience and accessibility, Localization, broad reach and Personalization.The dynamic development of mobile commerce and the increasing integration in the Internet have opened up an entirely new research and development field. M-business reaches beyond web based commerce to include core business processes such as B2C/C2C m- transactions, B2B m-transactions, Personal life management, Mobile office and Mobile operations back-office, supply chain management, and customer relationship management. Many commercial auction services have been launched in recent years, mostly based on the English auction method. With the advent of mobile commerce, the world has witnessed a concurrent reform in content delivery through the ability to provide content anywhere, anytime. With an increasingly mobile society where more and more people are on the move, mobile auctions seems to be the most compelling service that may revolutionize the mobile commerce landscape and make it dramatically more powerful and easier to use. Mobile auctions can be defined as [1] “a market institution with an explicit set of rules determining resource allocation and prices on the basis of bids from the market participants”. Auctions can be classified in different ways [2], there are open auctions as well as sealed bid auctions. There are auctions where the bidding prices ascend and auctions where the prices descend. The most commonly used auction types are the open-cry auction (also called English auction), where auction participants gather at one location, physical or virtual, at a pre-specified time and buyers can hear the bids submitted by competitor buyers and have to decide whether to bid higher or not within a limited time. In sealed bid auctions, auction participants are required to submit their bids by a specified deadline. The auctioneer keeps the bid information secret until the deadline when the bids are evaluated and the winner is declared. Sealed bid auctions can be either single round or multiple round. Dutch auctions are different. The auctioneer starts with a very high asking price. Then the price is decreased gradually until a buyer accepts the asking price. These auction methods can be compared quantitatively and qualitatively [3] based on information anonymity (information about products or people to be revealed during and after the auction), auction rules (start and end of the auction), pricing mechanisms. Most of the problems encountered in online auctions are the same for mobile auctions among which how to deal with 7th WSEAS International Conference on APPLIED COMPUTER SCIENCE, Venice, Italy, November 21-23, 2007 232