LONDON, 21 April 2011: Economic consultancy DotEcon has received a Queen’s Award for Enterprise in the Innovation category for the design and implementation of online auctions, used by governments worldwide for the sale of valuable public assets, notably radio spectrum.
DotEcon designed and implemented the combinatorial clock auction used for the recent UK spectrum auctions by Ofcom, which also intends to use the format for the forthcoming auction of 4G phone licences. Since 2002, DotEcon has also implemented more than 20 major spectrum auctions across the world, raising substantial government revenues: the auction of 3G and BWA licences in India generated £14bn in 2010.
DotEcon has been recognised for over ten years of continuous auction design and software development, enabling complex economic theory to be translated into practical application and a range of advanced auction formats to be tested and then efficiently and quickly deployed, using its web-based WebBidder platform.
In particular, the Award acknowledges the company’s pioneering work in implementing the combinatorial auctions that are ideally suited to selling radio spectrum. These allow bidders who rely on different technologies and different business plans to compete on a level playing field and regulators to maintain competitive markets by ensuring that spectrum does not become excessively concentrated in the hands of a few operators.
As well as its public sector work, DotEcon has advised bidders in spectrum auctions, and across other sectors including petrol retailing and nuclear energy, in more than a dozen countries across Europe, the Americas and Asia Pacific, helping them to develop and test auction bid strategies and to train their bid teams.
“Economics is not just about forecasting stuff”, commented DotEcon Founding Partner Dr Dan Maldoom, “rather economists are increasingly working like engineers, building practical tools to solve real-world problems. Better managing public assets like radio spectrum creates enormous value for everyone, from poorest to richest. Using auctions to award government-granted concessions and licences ensures that these vital resources are efficiently used and achieve a fair return for the taxpayer. Hopefully we will see these tools used ever more widely in both the public and private sector. We are very grateful for this recognition of our work in this field.”