Dynamic pricing system and method

• US 20070226064A1
• Filed: 03/29/2002
• Published: 09/27/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 03/29/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Oracle America, Inc. (Oracle Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Siebel Systems Inc. (Oracle Corporation)
• Inventors: Yu, Michael, Govil, Piyush, Yu, Jai-Jein, Nicholson, Catheryne, Ra, Do, Tan, Yan, Hao Li, Michael, Hsu, Karen
• Granted Patent: US 7,454,367 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/20
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/201 Price look-up processing, e.g. updating
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/06 Buying, selling or leasing transactions
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0603 Catalogue ordering
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0625 Directed, with specific intent or strategy
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0633 Lists, e.g. purchase orders, compilation or processing
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0641 Shopping interfaces
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/04 Trading; Exchange, e.g. stocks, commodities, derivatives or currency exchange

Abstract

A dynamic pricing system and method that enables prices for sellable objects to be dynamically adjusted using pricing factors corresponding to attributes of the sellable objects. Product administrators are enabled to define sellable products and extended attributes for the products, while pricing administrators are enabled to define price lists for the sellable products and extended attributes. Sales representatives build sellable objects, such as quotes, orders, shopping carts, etc, by adding products that customers would like to purchase to the sellable object. Additionally, extended attributes may be selected for all or a portion of the products. Using Static Pricing, an initial or static price is determined for the sellable objects. The static price may then be dynamically adjusted prior to or at the point of a sales transaction or offer using pricing factors corresponding to combinations of various attributes of the sellable object and/or products from which it is built.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for dynamically pricing a sellable object, comprising:

providing a first user interface to allow a user to define the sellable object, wherein the sellable object comprises

a product selected by the user from a list of products;

providing a second user interface to allow the user to selectively add an extended attribute to the selected product;

determining a static price for the sellable object as a function of a base price for the selected product and a base price for the selected, extended attribute;

determining pricing factors that are applicable to the sellable object based on the selected, extended attribute; and

generating a dynamic price by adjusting the static price for the sellable object based on the pricing factors determined to be applicable to the sellable object.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the pricing factors include a plurality of matrix-based pricing factors that are stored as a plurality of rows in at least one table.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

identifying a search criteria based on attributes of the sellable object

generating a query identifying the at least one table to search using the search criteria;

executing the query against a database in which the at least one table is stored.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing a third user interface by which any user may define a price book comprising data identifying products in the price book and pricing information corresponding to those products.

5. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

providing a fourth user interface by which any user may define extended attributes pertaining to products in the price book and pricing information corresponding to those extended attributes.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

defining a plurality of extended attribute classes, each extended attribute class including at least one extended attribute; and

associating extended attribute classes with products, wherein each product to which an extended attribute class is associated inherits the extended attributes defined for the respective extended attribute class.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein base prices for the selected product and the selected, extended attribute are defined using a first currency, the method further comprising:

enabling any user to select a second currency;

calculating an exchange rate between the first and second currencies; and

multiplying the dynamic price of the sellable object by the exchange rate.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising creating a plurality of price lists, each price list comprising base prices corresponding to at least a subset of products in the list of products.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein at least one of said plurality of price lists contains pricing information corresponding to a customer.

10. The method of claim 8, wherein at least one of said plurality of price lists contains pricing information corresponding to a region.

11. The method of claim 8, further comprising:

providing a user interface by which a user may define groups of extended attributes; and

automatically generating a plurality of price list items comprising at least a portion of at least one of said plurality of price lists, said plurality of price list items corresponding to the groups of extended attributes defined.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

defining a sequence in which pricing factors are applied; and

sequentially applying the pricing factors to the sellable object based on the sequence.

13. (canceled)

14. A machine-readable media storing instructions, which when executed by a processing system, cause the processing system to perform a method to dynamically price a sellable object, the method comprising:

providing a first user interface by which a user may define a list of products from which sellable objects may be defined, said list of products comprising descriptions of those products, and pricing information corresponding to those products;

providing a second user interface by which any user may define extended attributes pertaining to the products and pricing information corresponding to the extended attributes;

providing a third user interface by which any user may select a product from the list of products to build the sellable object;

providing a fourth user interface by which any user may selectively add for selectively adding an extended attribute to the selected product;

determining a static price for the sellable object as a function of a base price of the selected product and a base price for the extended attribute selectively added to the selected product;

determining pricing factors that are applicable to the sellable object based on the selectively added attribute; and

dynamically adjusting the static price for the sellable object based on the pricing factors determined to be applicable to the sellable object.

15. The machine-readable media of claim 14, wherein the pricing factors include a plurality of matrix-based pricing factors stored as a plurality of rows in at least one table in a database, and wherein the method further comprises:

specifying at least one search criterion based on attributes of the sellable object;

generating a query identifying the at least one table to search using the search criteria; and

executing the query against a database in which said table is stored to identify at least one matrix-based pricing factor applicable to the sellable object.

16. The machine-readable media of claim 14, wherein the method further comprises:

providing a fifth user interface by which any user may define a plurality of extended attribute classes, each extended attribute class including at least one extended attribute; and

providing a sixth user interface by which any user may associate extended attribute classes with products in the list of products, wherein each product to which an extended attribute class is associated inherits the extended attributes defined for the respective extended attribute class.

17. The machine-readable media of claim 14, wherein the prices for products and the extended attributes associated with the products are defined using a first currency, and wherein the method further comprises:

providing a fifth user interface by which any user may select a second currency to be used in pricing the sellable object;

calculating an exchange rate between the first currency and the second currency; and

multiplying the dynamically adjusted static price of the sellable object by the exchange rate.

18. The machine-readable media of claim 14, wherein the method further comprises providing a fifth user interface by which any user may create a plurality of price lists, each price list comprising base prices corresponding to at least a subset of the products in the list of products.

19. The machine-readable media of claim 18, wherein the method further comprises:

providing a sixth user interface by which any user may define groups of extended attributes; and

generating a plurality of price list items comprising at least a portion of at least one of said plurality of price lists, said plurality of price list items corresponding to the groups of extended attributes.

20. The machine-readable media of claim 14, wherein the method further comprises:

providing a fifth user interface by which any user may define a sequence in which the pricing factors are applied; and

sequentially applying the pricing factors to the sellable object based on the defined sequence.

21. (canceled)

22. A computer-implemented system comprising a distributed multi-tier architecture, wherein the distributed multi-tier architecture comprises:

a client machine tier comprising a client machine running a client-side software;

an application server tier comprising a application server coupled in communication with said client machine via a first computer network, each application server running a middleware software; and

a database tier comprising at least one database server running database server software to host a database in which data for the system are stored, each database server coupled in communication with the one application server via a second computer network,

wherein execution of the client-side, middleware, and database server software cooperatively performs operations comprising;

providing a first user interface on the client machine by which a user may select products from a list of products stored in the database to define a sellable object;

providing a second user interface on the client machine by which any user may selectively add an extended attribute to one of the selected products;

determining a static price for the sellable object as a function of a base price of the selected products and a base price for the extended attribute selectively added to the one of the selected products;

determining pricing factors that are applicable to the sellable object based on attributes of the sellable object or the extended attribute added to the one of the selected products; and

dynamically adjusting the static price for the sellable object based on the pricing factors determined to be applicable to the sellable object.

23. The system of claim 22, wherein the pricing factors comprise a plurality of matrix-based pricing factors stored as a plurality of rows in at least one table stored by the database server, and wherein execution of the client-side, middleware, and database server software further performs the operations of:

specifying a search criterion based on the attributes of the sellable object;

generating a query identifying at least one table to search using the search criteria; and

executing the query against the database server in which said table is stored to identify at least one matrix-based pricing factor applicable to the sellable object.

24. The system of claim 22, wherein execution of the client-side, middleware, and database server software further performs the operations of:

providing a third user interface on the client machine by which any user may define a plurality of extended attribute classes, each extended attribute class including at least one extended attribute; and

providing a fourth user interface on the client machine by which any user may associate extended attribute classes with products, wherein each product inherits the extended attributes defined for the associated extended attribute class.

25. The system of claim 22, wherein the base prices for products and extended attributes associated with the products are defined using a first currency, and wherein execution of the client-side, middleware, and database server software further performs operations of:

providing a third user interface on the client machine by which any user may select a second currency to be used in pricing the sellable object;

calculating an exchange rate between the first and second currencies; and

multiplying the dynamically adjusted static price of the sellable object by the exchange rate.

26. The system of claim 22, wherein the execution of the client-side, middleware, and database server software further performs the operations of:

providing a third user interface on the client machine by which any user may define product descriptions and pricing information; and

storing data corresponding to the product descriptions and the product pricing information in the database.

27. The system of claim 22, wherein execution of the client-side, middleware, and database server software further performs the operations of:

providing a third user interface on the client machine by which any user may define extended attribute descriptions and pricing information corresponding to extended attributes that may be associated with various products; and

storing data corresponding to the extended attribute descriptions and pricing information in the database.

28. The system of claim 22, wherein execution of the client-side, middleware, and database server software further performs the operations of:

providing a third user interface on the client machine by which any user may define pricing factors based on products, extended attributes of those products, and transaction attributes; and

storing data corresponding to the pricing factors in the database.

29. The system of claim 22, wherein execution of the client-side, middleware, and database server software further performs the operation of rendering a third user interface on the client machine by which any user may create a plurality of price lists, each price list comprising base prices corresponding to at least a subset of the products in the list of products.

30. The system of claim 29, wherein execution of the client-side, middleware, and database server software further performs the operations of:

providing a fourth user interface on the client machines to enable any user to define groups of extended attributes; and

automatically generating a plurality of price list items comprising at least a portion of at least one of said plurality of price lists, said plurality of price list items corresponding to the groups of extended attributes defined.

31. The system of claim 22, wherein execution of the client-side, middleware, and database server software further performs operations of:

providing a third user interface on the client machine by which any user may define a sequence in which pricing factors are applied; and

sequentially applying the pricing factors to the sellable object based on the sequence.

32. (canceled)