A market taking shape. Demand in Italy is still unproven
This page looks at agents buying and selling services to one another: a possible market, not a service we sell. Our research found no verifiable requests from Italian businesses to buy this kind of marketplace. We found experiments and international offerings, which do not establish demand in Italy. A gap does not automatically mean an opportunity: first, there needs to be evidence of a buyer.
What an agent-to-agent marketplace is, and what it is not
The same label is used for three different things: a marketplace where people buy ready-made agents; agentic commerce, where an agent makes purchases on a person's behalf; and a market where agents buy and sell services to one another without human involvement at every step. This page is about the third, which remains experimental.
Questions that need answers first
Which existing purchase would it make easier?
Before discussing price and security, identify a purchase your business already needs to make that an agent could simplify. Without a concrete answer, there is no basis for a project.
Who would you be dealing with?
A market needs identifiable, reliable counterparties. For an Italian business, it is still unclear who those counterparties would be and how to verify that their services match what they claim to offer.
Who controls spending, and who is accountable?
Who is accountable if a service is paid for but never delivered? Who bears the cost if an agent buys the wrong service? These responsibilities need to be settled in contracts before an agent is allowed to make purchases.
What we can assess today
Make your catalogue usable by other systems
Your catalogue, availability and terms need to be accurate and machine-readable for external systems to use them. Any work on these should address a need your business has today, regardless of whether an agent-to-agent market develops.
Set limits before any purchases
Before testing whether an agent could make purchases for your business, set a spending cap, approve the counterparties and make sure every transaction is recorded. These controls must be in place before any purchase, including a test.
Assess a recurring purchase
If you have a recurring order to simplify, we can assess whether it is worth automating, using known suppliers and a low spending cap. A trial should also measure how often a person needs to step in. That would tell you about that purchase, not prove that an agent-to-agent market exists.
Watch for evidence of demand
We follow developments in standards and payments between systems. To assess whether there is a market, we first look for verifiable requests from Italian businesses. Technical progress alone does not show that there is a buyer.
What we do not do
We do not sell you a marketplace
We have no product to sell in this area, and we do not build a platform before finding out who needs it. First, we need a specific business purchase and evidence that a buyer needs an agent-to-agent market to complete it.
We do not enable unrestricted automatic payments
An agent allowed to spend without a cap, a list of approved counterparties or a transaction record is a risk no saving justifies. Limits come first, even in a trial.
We do not call an experiment a “market”
International platforms and research exist. They do not establish demand among Italian businesses for agent-to-agent marketplaces, and we do not present them as evidence of it.
The work people would still do
If agents were to trade with one another, people would still decide who they could deal with, how much they could spend and what to do if a service was not delivered. Delegating the transaction to a system does not transfer accountability.
Choose the counterparties
You decide who your business will trade with, just as you do with suppliers today. A system cannot take responsibility for that choice on your behalf.
Review spending
Someone must check what was bought, how much was spent and whether the purchase was needed: weekly at first, then through spot checks. This is the same oversight you apply to a company card.
Handle services that are not delivered
If a paid service is not delivered, a person must contact the counterparty and work to resolve the dispute under the contract. The business remains responsible for handling the dispute; we do not hand that responsibility to agents.
Questions to ask first
- Which purchases do you make every month with the same suppliers and on the same terms?
- How much time do those orders take today, from request to confirmation?
- What spending limit would you set for a system making purchases without human approval?
- How do you check whether a counterparty is reliable, and which parts of that check could be automated?
- If an automated order went wrong, what would the mistake cost and who would notice?
Facts and sources
Even when several systems are involved, if a person is at the end of the chain, Article 50 of the AI Act — applicable since 2 August 2026 — requires them to be informed that they are interacting with an AI system, unless this is obvious.
Questions about agent-to-agent marketplaces
- Do agent-to-agent marketplaces already exist?
- International platforms and experiments exist. Our research found no verifiable requests from Italian businesses to buy this kind of marketplace. The existence of an offering does not establish demand.
- Why are you writing about it?
- Because some of the requirements may already matter to your business: machine-readable catalogues, spending limits and transaction records. They should be assessed against a need you have today. The prospect of an agent-to-agent market is not, by itself, a reason to invest.
- How is this different from agentic commerce?
- In agentic commerce, an assistant buys on behalf of a person, who remains the buyer. In an agent-to-agent marketplace, agents buy and sell services to one another without human involvement at every step. The systems carry out the transactions; people and businesses remain accountable.
- Is it worth preparing now?
- Start with what your business already needs: accurate product data that other systems can read, clear terms and spending controls. Each change should have a reason to exist even if this market never develops.
- Could an agent buy without human approval?
- That is something to assess for a specific purchase, with known suppliers and strict limits. Technical feasibility is only part of it: you also need to weigh the time saved, the cost of a mistake and who would step in. Such a trial would not establish a need for an agent-to-agent marketplace.
- What signs are you watching for?
- First, verifiable requests and actual purchases by Italian businesses. We also watch for shared rules on identifying counterparties and payment tools designed for these exchanges. These developments alone would not establish demand.
Is there a recurring purchase you want to simplify?
We can look at an order you place every month: the steps involved, the time it takes and the controls needed. That gives us a basis for assessing whether automation makes sense for your business, even if an agent-to-agent market never develops.