• Internet auctions
• Bid/Ask auction & exchange sites (e.g., "name a price" systems)
• Dynamic pricing models
• Personalized desktop messaging
• Streaming & multicasting

• Discovery & specification
• Rapid development & integration
• Delivery, testing, and acceptance
• Post-installation support

• Development of a complete discount travel website. This site uses customizable parameters to support automated bid/ask dialog with users, collects price elasticity information, provides secure transport of payment information, and interfaces with ticket fulfillment systems.
  
• Development of a site to manage the live and online auction of fine arts. This site makes it easy for remote sellers to catalog, "green room" and post items for sale, integrates multiple auction formats, bidder registration, and tracking of multiple simultaneous auctions.
  
• Development of a unique desktop information tracking and interactive display tool that provides user-specified dynamic data, along with programmable entry points and dynamic content provided by our unique multicasting infrastructure. For example, dynamic data could include dynamic pricing information.

• Method and Apparatus for Using Software Search Agents to Locate Items in Electronic Markets. This patent relates to a method of using software search agents to locate items in electronic markets or electronic auctions around the world. The ‘176 patent claims describe a system consisting of multiple electronic markets and electronic auctions interconnected over a computer network such as the Internet. The software search agent may be provided item identifying information and initiate requests to other electronic market or electronic auction to determine whether the item sought is available for purchase at such electronic markets or electronic auctions. Item information maintained in data repositories associated with the electronic markets or electronic auctions is obtained by the software search agent and collected for later use, such as for presenting the item search results obtained to Internet users. Patent Number: 6.085,176
  
  
• Consignment Nodes. The ‘265 patent relates to an electronic market for the sale of items and to a posting terminal for presenting a listing of an item for sale to the electronic market. The posting terminal of the ‘265 patent enables individual participants to connect over a network, such as the Internet, to electronically or virtually present items they wish to sell via an electronic market thereby enabling them to reach a vast audience of potential buyers, far more than they could reach in their local communities. The ‘265 patent also describes an automated system for selling items online and for accepting listings of items for sale electronically from remote participants connected to the automated system over a computer network. The ‘265 patent is designed to promote convenience and scalability by enabling user from around the world to electronically post goods to an electronic market. Patent Number: 5,845,265
  
  
• Method and apparatus for conducting person-to-person online auctions. Abstract. Auctioning an uniquely identified item (e.g., used goods or collectibles) with a computerized electronic database of data records on the Internet includes creating a data record containing a description of an item, generating an identification code to uniquely identify the item, and scheduling an auction for the item at the computerized database of records. The item is presented for auction to an audience of participants through a worldwide web mapping module executing in conjunction with the computerized database. The data record connotes an ownership interesting the item to a seller participant on the computerized electronic database of data records. The worldwide web mapping module translates information from the data record on the computerized database of records to a hypertext markup language (HTML) format for presentation through the Internet. Bids are received on the item from participants on the Internet through an auction process that executes in conjunction with the computerized database of data records. Auctioning of the item is terminated when the auction process reaches predetermined criteria. The auction participant is notified of the high bid in the auction process. The unique identification code is provided to the auction participant with the high bid to uniquely identify the item. Patent Number: 6,202,051
  
  
• Facilitating Electronic Commerce Through Two-Tiered Electronic Markets and Auctions. Abstract. A computer-implemented two-tiered electronic market system includes a data repository storing information corresponding to an inventory of one or more available items and a first-tier electronic market (e.g., a retail tier) that provides a first participant (e.g., a retail consumer) access to the inventory of one or more items in the data repository. The inventory is offered to the first participant under a first (e.g., retail) pricing scheme. The two-tiered electronic market system also includes a second-tier electronic market (e.g., a wholesale tier) that provides a second participant (e.g., a wholesale dealer), different from the first participant, access to the inventory of one or more items in the data repository. The inventory is offered to the second participant under a second (e.g., wholesale) pricing scheme different from the first pricing scheme. Electronic commerce is facilitated using an electronic auction system having at least a wholesale tier and a retail tier by presenting for auction an item description stored in the database operationally coupled to the electronic auction system. The presentation of the item includes a current retail bid amount. A wholesale bid is received from at least one wholesale-tier participant and the current bid amount is selectively displaced if the received wholesale bid increased by a predetermined amount is greater than the current retail bid. Patent Number: 6,266,651
  
  
• Establishing a Functional Brand In A Computer Networked Environment. A hierarchy of dynamic pricing information can be displayed by presenting one or more instances of a display module, each instance of which displays dynamic pricing information for an individual element of a specified level of dynamic pricing information hierarchy. A display module instance can serve as a functional brand, which indicates participation in a dynamic system by a source of origin of goods/services. Based on received user input designating another level of the dynamic pricing information hierarchy, the quantity of display module instances that are displayed is modified. The modified quantity corresponds (for example, is equal to ) to a quantity of elements in the designated other level of the dynamic pricing information hierarchy. In addition, the dynamic pricing information displayed by each display module instance can be modified to correspond to the designated hierarchy level. The dynamic pricing hierarchy can include a category level , a topic level and a sub-topic level. Establishing a functional brand can be accomplished by establishing a modular computer functionality (e.g., a display module) to include participation in a dynamic pricing system by a source of origin of goods/services and providing the modular computer functionality to a website that displays a brand of goods/services. Web pages displaying goods/services offered in commerce can be built having multiple instances of the modular computer functionality. Patent Number: WO 01/29743 A2
  
  
• Module Computer Program for Managing Dynamic Pricing Information. Users of a computer network (e.g., the Internet) can be encouraged to access dynamic pricing information (e.g., bid/ask pricing information for goods/services available in commerce) on the computer network (e.g., collected and maintained by a dynamic pricing system) by distributing to one or more users of the computer network (e.g., by e-mail) a modular computer program (e.g., a Java applet) that displays (e.g., in ticker format) dynamic pricing information collected from the computer network, and presenting to the one or more users of the modular computer program an interactive visual indication (e.g., a hyperlink or glyph) of a user-attractive resource available on the computer network (e.g., a contest, reword program coupons, etc. ). Access to the user-attractive resource can be provided to a user upon sensing that the user selected the interactive visual indication. The stream of dynamic pricing information displayed to users can have a predefined taxonomy, and the users can selectively view different levels of the taxonomy. Patent Number: WO 01/29744 A2
  
  
• Context-Sensitive Switching in a Computer Networked Environment. A conventional router can be used as a context-sensitive switch by encoding a header (e.g., a source and/or destination field of an address header) of a data packet with information descriptive of the data contained in a payload of the data packet and programming a router to route data packets based on the encoded information. The descriptive information can include dynamic pricing information (e.g., bid/ask pricing), for example, for goods/services available in commerce. The addressing scheme can correspond to a classification hierarchy having multiple levels such as a category level, a topic level and/or a sub-topic level. Patent Number: WO 01/29745 A2
  
  
• Generating and Navigating Streaming Dynamic Pricing Information. An interactive linkage between a search engine and dynamic pricing content available on a computer network can be provided by organizing links to dynamic pricing information (e.g., bid/ask pricing information) on the computer network into a predetermined taxonomy, and providing to the search engine a mapping between search requests and the predetermined taxonomy. The mapping includes reference pointers to dynamic pricing content that can be returned in response to search requests at the search engine. Accordingly, in response to a search request at the search engine, a reference pointer (e.g., an interactive link, a URL, a meta-tag and/or index into a database) to dynamic pricing information corresponding to the search request can be returned. Patent Number: WO 01/29746 A2
  

Contact us for a discussion of how we can put the MercExchange solutions to work for your e-commerce site. If you are a developer, we would like to discuss how our toolkits can improve the functionality and reduce time-to-implementation on your company's projects.