The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) is developing a Unified Agent Protocol to enable AI agents to make payments through the Unified Payments Interface (UPI), Business Standard reported. This initiative aims to facilitate autonomous, AI-driven transactions without human intervention, marking a significant step in digital payments innovation in India, according to medianama.com.
The protocol under development by NPCI draws inspiration from existing frameworks such as Coinbase's x402 protocol, which allows AI agents to autonomously discover and procure cloud resources and APIs to meet optimization goals. Similarly, Cloudflare uses x402 to enable publishers to charge for agent access to content. Pine Labs has also introduced an agentic payments protocol called P3P, which includes an open-source OAuth framework for authenticating AI agents, as noted by medianama.com.
Agentic commerce, where AI agents independently execute transactions, faces challenges due to competing protocols like those from OpenAI and Google. NPCI's Unified Agent Protocol could provide a standardized approach within India's payments ecosystem, potentially enhancing the efficiency and security of AI-driven commerce. This move aligns with global trends towards integrating AI capabilities in financial services, as highlighted by medianama.com.
NPCI has not yet disclosed specific technical details or timelines for the Unified Agent Protocol's rollout. The development follows growing interest from Indian payment players in agentic commerce, with Pine Labs' P3P framework serving as a notable precedent, medianama.com reported.