I have used a program developed in Germany called "Bid-O-Matic" (Biet-O-Matic in German). It's simple and it works. It's open source and appears to be in ongoing development. It has the interface option for 8 languages.
When you asked about this I didn't take into account domain auctions as I've never participated in one. My experience with this is limited to eBay so I don't know if it will work well for anything else. The website should have info about it. http://www.bid-o-matic.org/hp/