Michael Str bel worked for several years as a software engineer and consultant in the German IT industry before joining IBM Research in Switzerland where he developed his interest in support for negotiations in electronic markets During his career in research he has published several articles on this topic in major international conferences and journals and received a PhD from the University of St Gallen Switzerland

Based on his experiences and contributions the author discusses electronic negotiation technologies key ingredients for the next generation of electronic markets from a scientific as well as a practitioner s perspective He reviews the state of the art and then introduces novel support mechanisms and design elements which are applied in a number of case studies This book is geared towards technicians interested in E Commerce application development but also offers extensive background reading for educational purposes