The landscape of AI-powered shopping is rapidly evolving as tech giants make strategic moves.
Google is bolstering its agentic commerce capabilities with new Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) features, while OpenAI shifts its strategy after initial challenges with direct checkout. Meanwhile, Amazon is intensifying its presence in the AI shopping arena.
Google's Agentic Commerce Push
Google is enhancing its Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) with new features designed to make AI-driven shopping more robust and user-friendly. The UCP, an open standard for agentic commerce, will now allow AI agents to create multi-item carts, update product details in real-time by integrating with retailer catalogs, and link shopper identities to access loyalty and member benefits.
Google is also simplifying the UCP onboarding process for retailers, with partners like Commerce, Salesforce, and Stripe preparing to launch UCP on their platforms.
New capabilities in UCP include:
- Multi-item cart creation: Agents can now save or add multiple items to a shopping cart simultaneously from a single store.
- Real-time product updates: Retailers using UCP can provide agents with live product details such as variants, inventory levels, and pricing.
- Integration with loyalty programs: Identity Linking allows shoppers using UCP-integrated platforms to receive their usual loyalty or member benefits.
Vidhya Srinivasan, VP and General Manager of Ads and Commerce at Google, stated, "Agentic commerce is no longer just a concept, it’s reality." Google aims to remove the "grunt work" of shopping and build industry standards for seamless and secure agentic commerce.
OpenAI's Strategic Shift
These developments occur as OpenAI reevaluates its direct checkout strategy within ChatGPT. Following disappointing results from its ChatGPT Instant Checkout feature, OpenAI is reportedly scaling back plans for direct purchases within the platform.
Instead, the focus is shifting to enabling checkout within specific applications that integrate with ChatGPT. Studies indicate that while users engage with AI for product research and comparison, a significant portion remains hesitant to share payment information directly with AI agents and often completes purchases through other channels.
Early partners like Walmart and Shopify have noted the challenges. Walmart found that integrated checkout performed significantly worse than directing users to their website. Shopify is updating its approach to allow merchants' products to appear in ChatGPT conversations, but with purchases typically completed on the merchant's own online storefront.
Amazon's Growing Influence
Meanwhile, Amazon is actively expanding its role in the agentic shopping ecosystem. The company is broadening its Shop Direct program, which integrates products not sold directly by Amazon into its search results. When shoppers choose these items, Amazon facilitates the purchase on the merchant's website.
Industry experts note that while new AI players are emerging, established retailers like Amazon are also leveraging AI to own the purchasing journey. This move highlights the potential for third parties to insert themselves between merchants and customers, even at the point of transaction.
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Staff Report
Nathan Sellars
Staff Report
