But some economists note that reverse auctions work best when the assets being auctioned off are essentially identical.

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By market capitalisation, Priceline.com, which runs reverse auctions for airline tickets and a few other things (including groceries), is worth as much as American Airlines.

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Meanwhile, the once radical e-sourcing idea has become routine for Tata, which ran 750 reverse auctions on Ariba in the past year to bring down purchasing prices by an average of 7% for everything from ball bearings to the milk served in the company cafeteria.

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