Nexi Group and Google Cloud have signed an MoU to develop AI agent-based payment infrastructure across Europe.
Following this announcement, Nexi Group and Google Cloud have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to develop infrastructure supporting agentic commerce, where AI agents execute payments on behalf of consumers based on explicit authorisations, while also applying Google Cloud technologies to Nexi's internal operations.
The partnership brings together Google Cloud's AI and data infrastructure with Nexi's European payment network and acquiring capabilities. Under the agreement, the two companies will explore how to enable AI-driven shopping journeys and transactions at scale across European markets, with Nexi committing to support open-source commerce standards, including the Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) and the Agent Payments Protocol (AP2).
Building the technical foundation for AI-driven transactions
According to the official press release, the UCP and AP2 protocols sit at the core of the collaboration's technical scope. UCP is designed to orchestrate end-to-end AI commerce lifecycles, while AP2 functions as a trust layer for individual transactions, enabling payments to be executed via cryptographically signed mandates and verifiable credentials. By endorsing these open standards, Nexi joins other payments and technology companies working to define interoperable frameworks for agentic commerce.
The partnership also intends to enable what the companies describe as conversational sales channels — allowing merchants to capture purchase intent at the point it arises, whether through a search query or a video recommendation, and convert it into an AI-facilitated transaction. This approach is positioned as a shift from interaction-based commerce to intent-based, autonomous transaction flows.
Compliance with European regulatory requirements forms part of the stated scope. The companies aim to build a payment infrastructure that allows AI agents to operate within existing EU regulatory frameworks, though no specific regulatory instruments are named in the announcement.
Operational applications alongside consumer-facing ambitions
Beyond the consumer-facing dimension, the MoU covers operational applications within Nexi's own platforms. The company intends to use Google Cloud's AI and data analytics capabilities to identify improvements in real-time fraud detection, compliance automation, and merchant onboarding processes. These operational objectives are framed as complementary to the broader agentic commerce work, aimed at building a more resilient and cost-effective infrastructure.
The partnership will also explore how Google Cloud can support Nexi in extending the accessibility of its payment services to independent software vendors (ISVs), a segment relevant to Nexi's positioning in the European ecommerce mid-market.
