Title
Improved Revenue Bounds for Posted-Price and Second-rice Mechanisms
Abstract
We study revenue maximization through sequential posted-price (SPP) mechanisms in single-dimensional settings with n buyers and independent but not necessarily identical value distributions. We construct the SPP mechanisms by considering the best of two simple pricing rules: one that imitates the revenue optimal mechanism, namely, the Myersonian mechanism, via the taxation principle and the other that posts a uniform price. Our pricing rules are rather generalizable and yield the first improvement over long established approximation factors in several settings. We design factor-revealing mathematical programs that crisply capture the approximation factor of our SPP mechanism. In the single-unit setting, our SPP mechanism yields a better approximation factor than the state of the art prior to our work. In the multiunit setting, our SPP mechanism yields the first improved approximation factor over the state of the art after over nine years. Our results on SPP mechanisms immediately imply improved performance guarantees for the equivalent free-order prophet inequality problem. In the position auction setting, our SPP mechanism yields the first higher-than (1 -1=e) approximation factor. In eager second-price auctions, our two simple pricing rules lead to the first improved approximation factor that is strictly greater than what is obtained by the SPP mechanism in the single-unit setting.
Year
DOI
Venue
2021
10.1287/opre.2021.2121
OPERATIONS RESEARCH
Keywords
DocType
Volume
posted-price mechanisms, eager second-price auctions, multiunit, position auction, online advertising
Journal
69
Issue
ISSN
Citations 
6
0030-364X
1
PageRank 
References 
Authors
0.36
0
5
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
H Beyhaghi110.36
Negin Golrezaei286142.78
renato paes333136.45
M Pál410.36
B Sivan510.36