eBay said it is running a limited test that will expand the Best Offer feature, introduced in January (http://www.auctionbytes.com/cab/abn/y05/m01/i24/s01).

eBay had prohibited a company called Yldfire from marketing a similar but more fully featured service last fall called "Make an Offer" (MAO). Yldfire said pilot programs showed MAO auctions outperformed traditional auctions by 159 percent before eBay forced them to stop offering the service to eBay sellers.

Yldfire's two principals, John Hoffe and Yury Bogomolsky, gave different versions of what occurred, and the company disbanded, but the two say they own the patents (pending)covering the Make an Offer feature. In January, John Hoffe had said eBay's Best Offer feature was not infringing on the Yldfire patent, "as there are no dynamic processes involved in (eBay's) system."

eBay said this week's test will allow buyers to submit more than one offer per listing in certain subcategories within Cameras & Photo, Consumer Electronics, and Jewelry & Watches. Currently, buyers are limited to one offer that the seller can choose to accept or decline. eBay said based on the results, it may make this a permanent expansion in the future.

http://forums.ebay.com/db2/thread.jspa?threadID=410550213