Frank Tietze delivers an in-depth discussion of the impact of empirical results upon transaction cost theory, and in so doing, provides the means for better understanding technology transaction processes in general, and auctions in particular. Substantiating transaction cost theory with empirical auction data, the author goes on to explore how governance structures need to be designed for effective distributed innovation processes. He concludes that the auction mechanism is a viable transaction model, and illustrates that the auction design, as currently operated by market intermediaries,...