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Strip the announcements away
Every platform is racing to announce that agents can now shop. Behind the branding, the mechanics are the same everywhere: an agent needs to read your catalogue reliably, understand availability and price, and complete a purchase without a human clicking. That is a data problem and an API problem — not a new checkout.
Your catalogue is now an interface
For twenty years product data was decoration around a photo. Now it is the thing a machine reads to decide whether you are the answer. Missing GTINs, vague attributes, prices that only make sense after a login — every gap in your data is a place an agent silently skips you.
B2B is not exempt — it is early
Procurement systems have been machine-buying for years; agents are the same idea with better language skills. If your shop can already serve a customer-specific price over an API to a purchasing system, you are most of the way there. If it cannot, that is the gap to close — regardless of which protocol wins.
What to do this quarter, protocol wars aside
Clean your product data. Expose a stable, documented API for catalogue and pricing. Make availability truthful. These are worth doing even if every current agentic standard is dead in three years — which several of them will be.
- Agentic commerce is a data and API problem, not a checkout problem.
- Every gap in your product data is a silent skip.
- Clean data and a stable API pay off whichever protocol wins.
Frequently asked questions
A machine reads your catalogue, works out price and availability, and completes a purchase without a person clicking. That is it. Every platform announces it with different branding, but underneath the requirement is identical and unexciting: readable product data and an API that tells the truth. It is a data problem and an integration problem, not a new checkout.
None of them, yet. Several of the protocols being announced this year will be gone in three, and picking a winner early mostly buys you a migration. The good news is that the work underneath does not depend on the choice: clean product data, a documented catalogue and pricing API, truthful availability. Do that and you can speak whichever protocol survives.
B2B is not exempt — it has been doing this longer than anyone. Procurement systems have bought from suppliers over interfaces for years; agents are the same idea with better language skills. If your shop already serves a customer-specific price over an API to a purchasing system, most of the work is behind you. If it cannot, that gap is the actual project.
You get skipped, and nobody tells you. A human shopper puzzles out a vague attribute or emails your sales team; an agent hits the missing GTIN and moves to a supplier whose data answers the question. For twenty years product data was decoration around a photo. It is now the interface a machine reads to decide whether you are the answer.
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