EXPERIMENTS TESTING MULTIOBJECT ALLOCATION MECHANISMS

This paper reports the results of over 130 auctions conducted under co ntrolled conditions to examine the robustness of several auction mecha nisms to allocate multiple objects. The simultaneous discrete auction process used by the Federal Communications Commission to allocate Pers onal Communications licenses was contrasted with a sequential auction and a combinatorial auction over a variety of demand conditions. In te st environments created to check only the minimum competency of the pr ocedures, the simultaneous discrete auction process produces highly ef ficient allocations, approaching levels similar to those found with a continuo us form of the auction, and it outperforms a sequential aucti on. However, in environments created to stress test the procedures,a c ombinatorial auction outperforms the simultaneous discrete auction.