New privacy-preserving ascending auction for assignment problems

We introduce a new ascending auction that allocates heterogeneous objects among bidders with purely private unit demands. Our auction design differs from existing dynamic auctions in a number of ways: it economizes on information solicited from bidders by requiring marginal bidders to reveal a single new bid at a time; it uses a transparent price adjustment process; and it allows the seller to set starting prices above his reservation valuations. Despite these new features, (i) the auction stops in a finite time, (ii) sincere bidding is an ex-post Nash equilibrium, (iii) the auction ending prices and revenue depend only on bidders valuations and starting prices, and (iv) the auction is efficient if it starts with the seller's valuations.