Formal Verification of a Simple Automated Negotiation Protocol

Negotiation is a complex human activity and even in its most basic form consists of three elements: communication, strategy and bid evaluation. The elements are exactly the same in automated negotiation. In this paper we present four possible approaches for bid evaluation and strategy but we mainly focus on the communication aspect of the negotiation. Communication lends itself well to be specified and modeled as a protocol, so we introduce a basic automated negotiation protocol which we simulate and verify using PROMELA and the SPIN model checker.