What is Japanese Auction?
An e-Auction format where all bidders must accept each price level to continue, and the last bidder remaining wins.
Definition
A Japanese auction is a structured, buyer-driven descending format. Rather than suppliers naming prices, the buyer announces successive price levels and each supplier decides at each step whether to stay in or drop out. Suppliers who exit cannot re-enter.
How it works in practice
A buyer opens at a price all six suppliers accept, then steps the price down at fixed intervals. At each level, participants confirm acceptance. By the fourth step two have exited; by the seventh only one remains, and that supplier wins at the last accepted level.
Why it matters
The format suppresses tactical bidding and produces a clean read on each supplier's genuine walk-away point. It is slower than an English auction and requires suppliers to be comfortable with a public commitment at each step.
Run this on procurEngine.
Book a demo scoped to the categories and event formats you actually run.