Introducing Intelligent Commerce Connect
Visa has launched an on-ramp for merchants to harness its AI-driven platform, named Intelligent Commerce Connect. This initiative aims to enable AI agents to discover merchants and conduct purchases on behalf of users.
Current Pilot Status
The service is currently being tested with several partners, including AWS, with general availability anticipated by the end of June. This move positions Visa for potential growth in agentic commerce, although projections vary widely and remain speculative.
Aiming for Agentic Commerce Growth
McKinsey has projected that the U.S. retail market could reach up to $1 trillion in agent-driven transactions by 2030, while Precedence Research estimates global agentic commerce at less than $8 billion in 2025. Such figures hinge on significant technological advancements and widespread adoption.
Platform Features
The platform offers features such as secure payment initiation, tokenization, spend controls, and authentication for AI-initiated purchases. It is designed to work with any credit card, integrating APIs from various card networks alongside Visa’s own, and connecting with multiple payment token vault providers.
Transaction Process
When an AI agent initiates a purchase, the system identifies the appropriate payment credential, replaces the card number with a token, routes the transaction through the relevant network, and ensures that the agent adheres to user-defined parameters before passing payment credentials to the merchant.
Strategic Move
The launch is seen as a significant step into agentic AI. It builds on Visa’s earlier initiative, Visa Intelligent Commerce, which allowed AI agents to use stored Visa credentials at accepting merchants. According to Don Apgar from Javelin Strategy & Research, this move enables VAP-connected processors and acquirers to offer a turnkey agentic commerce platform that is interoperable with current standards.
While Visa’s customers are primarily card acceptance service providers rather than merchants, this initiative aims to support their end-users by leveraging new technologies more efficiently.
