Integration of Bargaining into E-Business Systems

Despite the fact that bargaining plays an important role in business communications, it is largely neglected in e-business systems. In this paper a conceptual model that integrates bargaining into web-based e-business systems will be developed starting from an informal characterisation of the bargaining process. Bargaining can be formalised as a two-player game, and integrated with the co-design approach for the design of web information systems. In this way bargaining games are played on parameterised story spaces, such that each move of a player adds constraints to the parameters. Each player follows a strategy for making moves, and winning strategies are characterised by highly-ranked agreements.