By Scott Friend
With the release of OpenAI Operator (yes, even as a “research preview”), we’re yet another giant step closer to the Agentic Commerce Era becoming the new reality for shoppers and merchants alike.
With launch partners including consumer services such as DoorDash and Uber, and online marketplaces like Priceline and StubHub, Operator’s introduction validates the potential value of generative AI taking agency on behalf of shoppers. OpenAI users can share their shopping preferences and buying credentials with AI agents, which will, in turn, autonomously peruse available options and buy on behalf of shoppers.
What does this mean for commerce at large?
Commerce is a $2.7 trillion part of our economy — which is why more than $200 billion is spent by retailers, marketplaces and brands each year on new commerce-related technology to better capitalize on all this opportunity.
As active participants in the commerce tech ecosystem over the past 25 years, my colleagues and I believe we have a unique vantage point to see what’s coming — and we’re convinced that agentic AI is the next wave of innovation that will massively change the commerce landscape.
To set some context: The first wave of modern digital disruption in retail was driven by the emergence of e-commerce and fueled by the rise of Amazon, launching in 1994 and achieving dominance in the 2000s. A decade or so later, in 2007, the iPhone introduction ushered in the next wave — moving digital commerce from the desktop to the mobile smartphone, enabling shopping anyplace, anytime.
With OpenAI’s release of Operator, I believe we’ll now see an acceleration in what will ultimately be viewed as the third wave of major digital commerce innovation: the Agentic Commerce Era. Operator is a shot across the bow of the past decade’s digital commerce leaders and will no doubt serve as an accelerant to the competing intelligent shopping agent efforts of everyone from Google and Shopify to Anthropic, Amazon and Perplexity.
AI buildup
Within hours of OpenAI’s public Operator announcement, Box CEO Aaron Levie noted that “AI agents having full browser access is going to open up 100x more use cases for AI. The web doesn’t have APIs for the long tail of tasks that we do every day on computers, and browser use is a major missing link. Another building block for AI is here.”
As consumers, we stand to benefit the most. Soon, we will be able to trust that AI agents will surf the digital ecosystem to get us exactly what we need, when we need it, at the best possible price.
But I don’t think that means intelligent shopping agents are going to usher in the death of traditional retail or the demise of influencers and creators. Quite the opposite.
The most experientially appealing brick-and-mortar shops, the best visually engaging digital store fronts, and key trusted, aspirational creators will not only persist but will thrive.
On the other hand, the tired and dust-collecting stores with unmotivated sales associates, the purely functional digital storefronts, and the creators who don’t really have a unique point of view are all at risk.
A key reason: AI agents will take on an ever-increasing amount of our more mundane shopping missions — whether meal planning for the week and the associated grocery shopping, rounding up back-to-school supplies for the kids, or searching for a great off-price or second-hand deal on a coveted brand.
In the next few years, we’ll all be trusting our AI personal shopping companion to handle the shopping that isn’t experiential, fun or engaging, on our behalf.
With Operator, and no doubt similar consumer-facing innovations from others to follow, commerce and the world around it is primed for an agentic future sooner than I believe anyone expected only a few months ago.
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei predicts that complex AI capabilities will be available in months, not years. Retailers and brands are going to have to adapt to this new reality — and fast. Those that learn to work with — not against — agentic AI will come out on top of this next wave of commerce innovation.
Scott Friend invests in commerce-related technology at Bain Capital Ventures, leveraging a career working in the commerce ecosystem. A former seed-to-exit founder of a successful Bain Capital-backed commerce-tech business, Friend and his BCV colleagues have invested in dozens of leading commerce-tech companies over the past 20 years, including Bloomreach, Rent the Runway, HookLogic, Flow Commerce, Jet, ShipBob, Attentive, Mirakl, Fermat Commerce, Archive, Wonder and most recently, ShopMy.
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