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Abstract

An aggregate conditional purchase offer (CPO) management system for receiving and processing CPOs from buyers for one or more goods or services is disclosed. Received CPOs are processed to determine whether the CPO should be provided to sellers individually and/or collectively as part of an aggregate CPO. If a CPO is accepted individually, or collectively as part of an aggregate CPO, the buyer is bound on behalf of the accepting seller. CPOs are administered on behalf of groups of buyers to form aggregate CPOs which are offered to sellers. Groups are preferably formed dynamically in accordance with predefined aggregation rules. The unit price associated with an aggregate CPO may be an average of the individual CPO prices for each CPO included in the aggregate CPO. Alternatively, the aggregate CPO price may be the total of the individual CPO prices for each CPO included in the aggregate CPO. The aggregation rules can optionally require that the terms of an individual CPO, including price, be within predefined tolerances of the terms of an aggregate CPO or one or more pending individual CPOs, in order for the individual CPO to be included in the aggregate CPO. Buyers may optionally review pending aggregate CPOs, prior to submitting a new CPO, so that the buyer can request to include the new CPO in one or more existing aggregate CPOs. Buyers may be requested to modify the original terms of a CPO to conform the terms to an existing aggregate CPO or one or more pending individual CPOs, so that the modified CPO can be included with the pending aggregate CPO or the pending individual CPOs to form a new aggregate CPO.

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