As you might have read, last month we announced our proposed acquisition of LiveAuctioneers. We would like to share with you new developments at Auction Technology Group and the impact of this anticipated purchase.
The proposed acquisition of LiveAuctioneers will help us deliver three key things you have said you want from us:
1) American Bidders
All our auctioneer partners consistently communicate the most important thing we can do for them: bring them more bidders. LiveAuctioneers enables us to bring 56 million online bidder sessions, specifically by American bidders, to your auctions. With the combination of thesaleroom.com and liveauctioneers.com, you will have access to those bidders, helping you drive even stronger results for your consignors.
2) Simpler Payments Management
We have heard repeatedly that payments can be an obstacle to buying online at auction and that it also can be an administrative burden for auctioneers. With LiveAuctioneers, ATG will be able to offer you the same integrated payment solution currently offered to LiveAuctioneers’ partners, improving the ease of buying at auction, boosting bidder confidence and increasing the number of bidders that are willing to bid online at auction.
The LiveAuctioneers payments service also provides charge-back protection options for auctioneers. As ATG can aggregate the buying power of more than 2000 auction houses, we can negotiate better deals with payment service providers allowing us to offer these services at competitive rates, with the goal of it costing you less than your current payment solution.
3) Better Online User Experience
We realise that as the world moves online, your bidders are expecting more. They are used to the simple, secure, easy-to-use online buying experience provided by Amazon, eBay, Etsy, and others and they expect a high quality, secure, and easy buying experience when buying at auction.
Our proposed acquisition of LiveAuctioneers will allow us to invest in even more features and functionality more quickly to make it simpler for you to run your auctions online while also making it easier for your customers to buy online, keeping you competitive with these other e-commerce platforms.
ATG is committed to a shared success model with auction houses. We grow only as you grow. We are committed to stable pricing, providing tools that lower your operating costs, and offering an increasing range of value-added services - payments initially and eventually more.
Online auctions are an exciting growth segment of the digital world with scope to expand in the US, Europe, Asia, as well as in the UK. We want to help you grow and to deliver maximum value for your consignors. ATG is committed to ensuring that the auction industry is prepared for the future and for the many opportunities that lie ahead of it as bidders move increasingly online.
We are excited by our proposed acquisition of LiveAuctioneers and look forward to sharing with you more of the benefits it will deliver in the near future.
John-Paul Savant
CEO, Auction Technology Group
