WORLD-RENOWNED AUCTION Designers
Expert Advice on
Auctions & Market Design
Since 1993, Cramton Associates LLC has provided expert advice to governments and companies on the design of auction markets to best achieve goals. The markets typically involve the trade of many interrelated products. The main applications are in communications (radio spectrum), electricity, financial securities, rough diamonds, top-level domains, wind rights, emissions, and transportation. In addition to auction design, the work also involves advising bidders participating in auction markets.
- Hundreds of auctions in many industries
- In over 20 countries around the world
Economic Consulting
Practice Areas
01.
Spectrum Auctions
Spectrum auctions play a critical role in assigning and pricing spectrum for mobile communications. Each year, we advise governments on the design of auctions and work with bidders participating in spectrum auctions. The stakes are high for both governments and participants. Spectrum is a critical input to an essential service.
02.
Electricity Markets
Restructured electricity markets are among the most complex smart markets. The market must balance supply and demand every second, despite large shocks to supply and demand from outages, weather, and other forces. We bring expertise in electricity market design to regulators, system operators, and market participants.
03.
Antitrust & Competition
Competitive markets stimulate innovation and yield efficient outcomes. In many settings, maintaining competition is difficult because of scale economies or other entry barriers. We have extensive experience in advising regulators and market participants on how to promote competition.
Most Recent
Projects
Developed a modeling tool for PJM to better understand the impact of market rules and policies on the energy transition.
Advised the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Australia, and Thailand on spectrum auction design (ongoing).
Advised bidders in auctions for wind rights in the United States and the United Kingdom (ongoing).
Advised Peru on electricity market design (2021).
Advised FiberRise Communication in the United State’s Rural Development Opportunity Fund Auction to provide broadband service in unserved areas (2020).
Peter Cramton, Chair
Peter Cramton is Professor of Economics Emeritus at the University of Maryland. Since 1983, he has conducted research on auctions and market design, with a focus on the design of complex markets to best achieve goals. Applications include electricity markets, financial markets, and auctions for radio spectrum. He has introduced innovative market designs in many industries. Cramton has advised numerous governments on market design and dozens of bidders in major auctions. He is chief economist and advisor for startups in finance, insurance, and communications. From 2015-2021, he was an independent director of the board of the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT). He received his B.S. in Engineering from Cornell University and his Ph.D. in Business from Stanford University.
Team Members
Pat Sujarittanonta
Principal
Pacharasut (Pat) Sujarittanonta is a Professor of Economics at Chulalongkorn University, Thailand, and a Principal of Cramton Associates LLC. His research focuses on auctions and market design. He has worked on a variety of issues such as spectrum auctions, antitrust and M&A. He has provided advice on spectrum auction design and strategy to governments and bidders in over 10 countries. He also has extensive experience in design and competition issues in wholesale electricity markets in the United States. He received his Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Maryland and earned an M.A. in Economics and Finance and First Class Honor B.Eng. in Computer Engineering from Chulalongkorn University.
David Malec
Principal
David Malec is a Principal of Cramton Associates LLC and a postdoctoral research scholar at the Economics Department of the University of Maryland. His research focuses on topics on the interface between the fields of computer science and economics, and how complex economic settings can be approached algorithmically. Of particular interest is how algorithmic techniques in approximation can be used to design near-optimal economic mechanisms in settings where exactly-optimal have proven elusive, and how such techniques can be adapted to take advantage of the types of information available in practical economic settings. His work has appeared in top conferences in algorithmic game theory and theoretical computer science. He received his B.A. in Computer Science and Mathematics from Lake Forest College in 1997, and his Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Wisconsin, Madison in 2014.
Simon Brandkamp
Principal
Simon is a Ph.D. student in Economics at the University of Cologne under the supervision of Peter Cramton. His research focuses on market design and behavioral economics with a particular interest in energy and electricity markets. He holds a Bachelor’s degree in Philosophy & Economics from the University of Bayreuth and a Master’s degree in Economic Research from the University of Cologne. Simon also worked as a trainee in the energy market analysis team of McKinsey & Company and as an intern in the Norwegian renewable energy company Statkraft.