An Efficient Protocol for Negotiation over Multiple Indivisible Resources

Sabyasachi Saha, Sandip Sen

We study the problem of autonomous agents negotiating the allocation of multiple indivisible resources. It is difficult to reach optimal outcomes in bilateral or multi-lateral negotiations over multiple resources when the agents' preferences for the resources are not common knowledge. Self-interested agents often end up negotiating inefficient agreements in such situations. We present a protocol for negotiation over multiple indivisible resources which can be used by rational agents to reach efficient outcomes. Our proposed protocol enables the negotiating agents to identify efficient solutions using systematic distributed search that visits only a subspace of the whole solution space.

URL: http://www.mcs.utulsa.edu/~sahasa/IJCAI-SahaS1339.pdf