Machine customers, whatever could that be?
This is AI in commerce. It isn't getting a lot of coverage right now but this is something that will move trillions in value.
For months now, many have debated the growing role of artificial intelligence in the future of jobs and economies, but little has been said about the potential role in replacing consumers in decision making processes.
Specifically when it comes to commerce, the world is yet to process the potential impact of AI in commerce.
There's great focus on the job market when it comes to artificial intelligence and for really good reasons. Many reports have already covered why AI will cause millions to lose their jobs.
Various prominent voices have supported the notion over the years.
Bill gates already expects AI to substitute humans in most things, predicting that technological advances, especially in artificial intelligence, will probably result in a shortened two-day work week within the next decade, according to the Express US report.
Across several field tests, AI already performs better than humans on jobs, and this is only going to improve.
Notwithstanding, replacing humans in workspaces isn't all AI will do.
Besides replacing workers, AI will also replace shoppers.
I talked about this recently when I wrote about digital ads of the future being designed to target AI agents, not humans.
What's to expect of an AI-powered world is that human’s active involvement in day to day activities or operations will be significantly reduced.
Humans will have less web browsing footprint, and as a result, will be responsible for less digital transactions.
Machine customers are a subset of AI agents, designed specifically to autonomously purchase goods, negotiate transactions and influence commercial decisions.
An earlier report in February, by Forbes, highlighted that Machine Customers will move as much as $30 trillion by 2030. CEOs and senior business executives, reportedly expect machine customers to generate at least 21% of their revenue by this time.
This is a report that was recently cited by a16zcrypto, in its “State of Crypto 2025” report.
The payment solutions to enable this future has already been built by companies like Google, with its A2A protocol and Coinbase, with its x402 open payment protocol, which has recently exploded in usage, recording 19K+ users in a single day, 128K txns, $124K in volume, according X post by KuCoin Ventures.
The agentic future is more real than people can currently imagine. Machines will be responsible for moving significantly economic value over the next decade, proving that AI’s tech goes beyond jobs replacement.
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