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Related papers: Multi-Agent Combinatorial Contracts

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We initiate the study of online contracts, which integrate the game-theoretic considerations of economic contract theory, with the algorithmic and informational challenges of online algorithm design. Our starting point is the classic online…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2026-02-10 Elad Lavi , Hadas Shachnai , Inbal Talgam-Cohen

This paper considers the hidden-action model of the principal-agent problem, in which a principal incentivizes an agent to work on a project using a contract. We investigate whether contracts with bounded payments are learnable and…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2024-02-23 Yurong Chen , Zhaohua Chen , Xiaotie Deng , Zhiyi Huang

In the classical principal-agent hidden-action contract model, a principal delegates the execution of a costly task to an agent. In order to complete the task, the agent chooses an action from a set of actions, where each potential action…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2025-11-27 Tomer Ezra , Stefano Leonardi , Matteo Russo

We consider the principal-agent problem with heterogeneous agents. Previous works assume that the principal signs independent incentive contracts with every agent to make them invest more efforts on the tasks. However, in many…

Multiagent Systems · Computer Science 2019-11-12 Shenke Xiao , Zihe Wang , Mengjing Chen , Pingzhong Tang , Xiwang Yang

We study a Bayesian contract design problem in which a principal interacts with an unknown agent. We consider the single-parameter uncertainty model introduced by Alon et al. [2021], in which the agent's type is described by a single…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2025-02-21 Martino Bernasconi , Matteo Castiglioni , Andrea Celli

Multi-agent systems can be extremely efficient when working concurrently and collaboratively, e.g., for transportation, maintenance, search and rescue. Coordination of such teams often involves two aspects: (i) selecting appropriate…

Robotics · Computer Science 2023-08-29 Zili Tang , Junfeng Chen , Meng Guo

A practical challenge in reinforcement learning are combinatorial action spaces that make planning computationally demanding. For example, in cooperative multi-agent reinforcement learning, a potentially large number of agents jointly…

Principal-agent problems model scenarios where a principal incentivizes an agent to take costly, unobservable actions through the provision of payments. Such problems are ubiquitous in several real-world applications, ranging from…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2025-02-27 Francesco Bacchiocchi , Jiarui Gan , Matteo Castiglioni , Alberto Marchesi , Nicola Gatti

In many multiagent domains a set of agents exert effort towards a joint outcome, yet the individual effort levels cannot be easily observed. A typical example for such a scenario is routing in communication networks, where the sender can…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2014-01-17 Moshe Babaioff , Michal Feldman , Noam Nisan

This paper explores the capacity of artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms to autonomously design incentive-compatible contracts in dual-principal-agent settings, a relatively unexplored aspect of algorithmic mechanism design. We develop a…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2024-06-14 Qian Qi

The increasing deployment of AI is shaping the future landscape of the internet, which is set to become an integrated ecosystem of AI agents. Orchestrating the interaction among AI agents necessitates decentralized, self-sustaining…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2024-10-08 Dima Ivanov , Paul Dütting , Inbal Talgam-Cohen , Tonghan Wang , David C. Parkes

A contract is an economic tool used by a principal to incentivize one or more agents to exert effort on her behalf, by defining payments based on observable performance measures. A key challenge addressed by contracts -- known in economics…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2024-12-24 Paul Duetting , Michal Feldman , Inbal Talgam-Cohen

We introduce a new class of combinatorial markets in which agents have covering constraints over resources required and are interested in delay minimization. Our market model is applicable to several settings including scheduling, cloud…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2017-04-17 Nikhil Devanur , Jugal Garg , Ruta Mehta , Vijay V. Vazirani , Sadra Yazdanbod

Cooperation is fundamental in Multi-Agent Systems (MAS) and Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning (MARL), often requiring agents to balance individual gains with collective rewards. In this regard, this paper aims to investigate strategies to…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2024-05-06 Vaigarai Sathi , Sabahat Shaik , Jaswanth Nidamanuri

We study the problem of agent-based negotiation in combinatorial domains. It is difficult to reach optimal agreements in bilateral or multi-lateral negotiations when the agents' preferences for the possible alternatives are not common…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2012-02-20 Minyi Li , Quoc Bao Vo , Ryszard Kowalczyk

We study a general online combinatorial auction problem in algorithmic mechanism design. A provider allocates multiple types of capacity-limited resources to customers that arrive in a sequential and arbitrary manner. Each customer has a…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2023-10-10 Xiaoqi Tan , Alberto Leon-Garcia , Yuan Wu , Danny H. K. Tsang

We study principal-agent problems in which a principal commits to an outcome-dependent payment scheme -- called contract -- in order to induce an agent to take a costly, unobservable action leading to favorable outcomes. We consider a…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2024-06-10 Francesco Bacchiocchi , Matteo Castiglioni , Alberto Marchesi , Nicola Gatti

We analyze conditional optimization problems arising in discrete time Principal-Agent problems of delegated portfolio optimization with linear contracts. Applying tools from Conditional Analysis we show that some results known in the…

Mathematical Finance · Quantitative Finance 2016-06-15 Julio Backhoff , Ulrich Horst

We introduce a combinatorial variant of the cost sharing problem: several services can be provided to each player and each player values every combination of services differently. A publicly known cost function specifies the cost of…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2017-04-28 Shahar Dobzinski , Shahar Ovadia

Quantitative requirements play an important role in the context of multi-agent systems, where there is often a trade-off between the tasks of individual agents and the constraints that the agents must jointly adhere to. We study multi-agent…

Logic in Computer Science · Computer Science 2024-12-18 Rafael Dewes , Rayna Dimitrova