A third-party negotiation automation tool for generating cost estimates on behalf of a seller is described herein. In response to receiving a request for a product from a buyer, a seller may choose to participate in a negotiation for fulfilling the request. The system may utilize one or more data sources, such as user-provided data, third-party data, and the like, to generate a cost estimate on behalf of the seller for fulfilling the request. The seller may choose to accept, modify, or decline the generated cost estimate before providing the cost estimate to the buyer for acceptance. This process may continue for one or more rounds, dependent upon the request, with the final cost estimates provided to the buyer for selection at the conclusion of the one or more rounds. In this way, the cost estimates generated on behalf of the seller may be optimized, thereby reducing the likelihood of inaccurate cost estimates and reducing the system resources required to process large volumes of bids received at or around the same time.

Some embodiments include apparatuses providing control over movement of motorized transport units at a retail facility, comprising: multiple self-propelled motorized transport units; a wireless communication network; and a central computer system, wherein the central computer system comprises: a transceiver; a control circuit; and a memory storing computer instructions that when executed cause the control circuit to: receive an override command, from a worker associated with the retail facility, to cause a first motorized transport unit of the multiple motorized transport units to implement one or more actions; confirm a valid authorization of the worker to override one or more operating limits of the first motorized transport unit; and override the one or more operating limits and communicate one or more instructions to the first motorized transport unit configured to cause the first motorized transport unit to implement the one or more actions in accordance with the override command.

Method and system for recording data describing a first entity, the data endorsed by a second entity comprising the second entity validating data describing the first entity, wherein an identifier is associated with the data, the identifier being generated from a public key of the first entity. Cryptographically signing data corresponding with the data describing the first entity using at least a private key of the second entity. Posting a transaction to a block chain including the cryptographically signed data. Method and system for obtaining data describing a first entity the data endorsed by a second entity comprising. Receiving an identifier of data describing the first entity. Retrieving an entry from a block chain based on the received identifier. Authenticating the entry using a public key of the second entity. Extracting the data describing the first entity from the retrieved entry.

There is provided a listing support system or the like smoothly performing the guidance after the start of the listing procedure, particularly providing flexible listing support according to a wide variety of categories of listed items, and a method for providing an article commerce intermediation service on a server configured to be accessible from multiple user terminals, the method comprising: continuously recognizing an article in an image shot by a user terminal; extracting a category of the article by the recognition; and starting a listing procedure for treating the article as a listing item in commerce intermediation based on the extracted category.

A method for presenting properties includes retrieving property listings from sources; converting the listings to a common format; and storing the listings in the common format in a parcel database; monitoring actions of a buyer when searching for and viewing initial listings from the parcel database that meet initial requirements of the buyer, calculating analytics of the actions, generating revised property listings from the parcel database that meet revised requirements of the buyer based on the analytics, and presenting the revised listings to both the buyer and an agent; and examining communications between the buyer and the agent within an automated system, and automatically enhancing collaboration between the buyer and the agent, the examining including: automatically detecting topics within the communications which can benefit from additional information; retrieving the additional information from one or more public data sources; and automatically inserting the additional information into a stream of the communications.

A system for presenting properties includes: a server, coupled to client devices via the internet, the server including: a unification module, that periodically accesses data sources for listings, where the data sources include on-market sources and off-market sources, and that retrieves the listings from the sources, converts the listings to a common format, and stores the listings in the common format, and that detects deficiencies in the listings that cannot be resolved by accessing public data sources; and an intelligence module, that receives a request from the unification module for data that can resolve the deficiencies, and that accesses an external entities database to select external entities that can provide the data, and that automatically generates requests to the external entities to provide the data, and that automatically receives the data to enable the unification module to update a parcel record in a parcel database associated with the deficiencies.

A method for presenting properties includes accessing data sources for listings, where the data sources include on-market sources and off-market sources, the accessing including: retrieving the listings from the sources; converting the listings to a common format; detecting deficiencies in the listings; requesting and receiving additional data to resolve the deficiencies, where the additional data is obtained from one or more public data sources; and storing the listings in the common format in a parcel database; and monitoring actions of a buyer when searching for and viewing initial property listings from the parcel database that meet initial requirements of the buyer, calculating analytics of the actions, generating revised property listings from the parcel database that meet revised requirements of the buyer based on the analytics, and presenting the revised property listings to both the buyer and an agent.

A method for presenting properties includes retrieving listings from a plurality of sources, and converting the converting and storing the listings in a common format; monitoring buyer actions when searching for and viewing initial property listings, calculating analytics of the actions, generating revised listings based on the analytics, and presenting the revised listings; and examining communications, and optimizing collaboration, the examining comprising: detecting keywords in the communications that indicate a degree of urgency of the communications, and automatically selecting a preferred medium for transmission that corresponds to the degree of urgency, and transmitting the communications via the preferred medium; and detecting requests for additional information, automatically accessing one or more public data sources determine if the additional information is available, and if the additional information is available, retrieving the additional data from the one or more public data sources, and automatically presenting the additional information to the buyer.

A method for providing merchant offers includes receiving, by a network interface circuit of an offer computing system, selection of a product or service from a customer user of the offer computing system, receiving, by the network interface circuit of the offer computing system, financial account information from the customer user, the financial account information providing access to a financial account held by the customer user, monitoring, by a merchant offer circuit of the offer computing system, a financial status of the customer user using the financial account information, and based on the financial status of the customer user, sending to the customer user, by the merchant offer circuit of the offer computing system, an offer for sale of the product or service.

In accordance with an embodiment, a server apparatus manages stock of a food product owned by a user. The server apparatus includes a communication device, a stock management database, a recipe management database, a storage device, and a controller. The controller calculates, when the controller receives information indicating recipe information of a cooking target from a terminal device of the user via the communication device, a consumption quantity of the food product, which is based on a quantity of the food type specified in the recipe information of the cooking target in the recipe management database. The controller subtracts the calculated consumption quantity from the stock quantity of the food type specified in the recipe information of the cooking candidate in the stock management database.