Coin Newsweek – February 25, 2026 – Kite, an AI-powered agent payment Layer 1 project, has announced its official entry into the Google Agent Payments Protocol (AP2) as a community partner. The collaboration places Kite alongside more than one hundred industry giants, including Mastercard, PayPal, Shopify, Adobe, Walmart, Accenture, and Cloudflare.
The AP2 initiative represents Google’s strategic foray into the intersection of artificial intelligence and digital payments, creating a framework for secure and efficient transactions between AI agents and the broader digital economy. By joining this ecosystem, Kite positions itself at the forefront of the emerging smart agent economy.
Kite’s inclusion in the AP2 community partner list marks a significant validation for the Layer 1 project, which focuses specifically on building payment infrastructure tailored to AI-driven agents. The company’s technology aims to enable seamless, secure, and automated transactions between autonomous AI systems, a market segment that many analysts believe will grow exponentially in the coming years.
The partnership roster reads like a who’s who of global commerce and technology. Mastercard and PayPal bring decades of payments expertise and established merchant networks. Shopify and Adobe contribute e-commerce and digital experience platforms. Walmart represents the retail giant perspective, while Accenture offers enterprise consulting muscle. Cloudflare adds critical internet infrastructure and security capabilities.
For Kite, being listed alongside such established players signals that its technology and vision have earned recognition from one of the world’s largest technology companies. Google’s stamp of approval could open doors to additional partnerships, integrations, and adoption opportunities as Kite continues to develop its payment infrastructure.
Kite described the collaboration as “a significant milestone” in its journey to build trusted payment infrastructure for the smart agent economy. The team emphasized its continued commitment to advancing secure and trusted smart agent payment solutions, suggesting that this partnership is just the beginning of deeper integration with the AP2 ecosystem.
The smart agent economy refers to a future where autonomous AI systems perform tasks, make decisions, and execute transactions on behalf of humans or other agents. For this vision to become reality, robust payment infrastructure must exist that allows agents to transact securely, efficiently, and with appropriate oversight. Kite aims to provide exactly this infrastructure layer.
Google’s AP2 protocol establishes standards and frameworks for agent-to-agent and agent-to-human payments. By joining as a community partner, Kite gains access to these standards and the ability to influence their development, ensuring that its infrastructure aligns with the broader ecosystem’s direction.
The partnership also provides Kite with visibility among the other AP2 partners, potentially leading to integration opportunities with companies like Shopify, Adobe, or Walmart. For these established enterprises, working with a specialized Layer 1 project like Kite could accelerate their own AI payment capabilities.
Kite’s focus on AI-powered payments addresses a growing need in the technology landscape. As AI agents become more sophisticated and autonomous, the ability to transact independently becomes essential. Whether an AI shopping for supplies, negotiating service contracts, or managing digital assets, payment infrastructure must keep pace with agent capabilities.
The Layer 1 designation means Kite operates its own blockchain or base layer protocol, providing the foundational infrastructure upon which other applications can build. This positions Kite as an infrastructure provider rather than simply an application, giving it greater control over the payment environment and potentially greater long-term strategic importance.
Kite’s journey to this point has involved significant technical development and community building. The project has been working on solutions for agent identity verification, transaction authentication, and secure value transfer between autonomous systems. The Google AP2 partnership suggests that this work has reached a level of maturity recognized by one of tech’s most influential players.
Looking ahead, Kite will likely deepen its engagement with the AP2 ecosystem, potentially participating in working groups, contributing to protocol development, and building integrations with other partners. The company may also leverage the partnership to attract additional developers and projects to its platform.
For the broader cryptocurrency and AI communities, Kite’s inclusion in AP2 serves as a signal that specialized blockchain projects can gain recognition from mainstream technology leaders when they address clear, emerging needs. The intersection of AI and payments represents one of the most promising frontiers in both industries, and Kite has positioned itself to play a significant role.
Source: Kite AI official announcement / Google AP2 partnership listing
Disclaimer: This content is for market information only and is not investment advice.
