Auctions with endogenous participation and quality thresholds2009

"Infrastructure projects are often technically complicated and highly customized. Therefore, procurement competition tends to be limited. Competition is the single most important factor toward auction efficiency and anti-corruption. However, the degree of competition realized is closely related to bidders' entry decision and the auctioneer's decision on how to assess technical attributes in the bid evaluation process. This paper estimates the interactive effects among quality, entry, and competition. With data on procurement auctions for electricity projects in developing countries, it is found that large electricity works are by nature costly and can attract only a few participants. The limited competition would raise government procurement costs. In addition, high technical...