Patent ID: 7421402

Claim:
A method for allocating available resources in an on-demand computing environment, said method comprising: listing, concurrently or in advance, available resources from at least one resource producer according to a trend prediction of resource availability in the past by at least one automated producer trending agent (PTA); monitoring by said PTA the resource availability from a producer over a period of time; updating a historical trend of available resources according to said monitored period of time; producing listings of resources expected to be available in a period of time in the future; placing one or more usage bids for on-demand computing resources on behalf of at least one consumer according to historical usage data of said consumer resource consumption by at least one automated consumer trending agent (CTA); monitoring by said CTA on-demand resource consumption by a consumer over a period of time; updating a historical trend of resource consumption according to said monitored period of time; producing bids by said CTA for resources expected to be needed in a period of time in the future; receiving by a resource entitlement arbitration system (REAS) said lists of available resources from said PTAs and said bids from said CTAs; determining by said REAS if conditions specified by any said bids match any said lists; producing at least one tier-based dynamic incentive (TDI) schema by at least one PTA, said TDI containing a plurality of tiers of bidder definitions, and containing an incentive resource to be allocated to a winning bidder; evaluating, by a tier-based arbitrator (TA) in cooperation with said REAS, said received bids, said listings, and said TDI; determining if a bid matches a listing and associated TDI; notifying said PTAs and CTAs that said match has been found thereby establishing a contract for consumption of said matched listed resources and said bid; and notifying said CTA by said REAS of a highest bid placed by all bidding CTA; placing by said CTA one or more subsequent bids responsive to said notification until said bid is accepted, or until said bid reaches a predetermined level; notifying said PTA by said REAS of a highest bid placed by all bidding CTA; updating by said PTA listings of available resources responsive to said notification until said a bid accepted, or until said listing reaches a predetermined level; and withdrawing by said PTA its listed resources from availability under at least one predetermined condition selected from the group of failure to receive a bid matching a reserve price, failure to receive a matching bid within a period of offering time, failure to receive a matching bid from a qualified consumer.