COOCON, a prominent South Korean business data platform company, has announced its membership as a Silver Member of the Agentic AI Foundation (AAIF). This strategic move, effective from 1st June, positions COOCON within a global network of over 180 companies, including leading artificial intelligence developers such as OpenAI, Google, Anthropic, and Microsoft.
The AAIF, an open-source foundation operating under the Linux Foundation, is dedicated to establishing and governing open standards and protocols for enhancing interoperability among AI agents. Its core mission involves driving global standardisation across the burgeoning AI industry, a critical step as AI technologies become increasingly integrated into daily operations and commercial transactions.
By joining the AAIF, COOCON intends to significantly expand its global reach and foster deeper collaborations with key players in the AI agent sector. The company plans to actively engage in various working groups focused on AI agent payments and AI-based data businesses, particularly those built upon the Model Context Protocol (MCP). This participation is expected to bolster COOCON's technological foundation and secure its competitive edge in the rapidly evolving global payment and data markets.
The evolution of AI agents is moving beyond simple product recommendations to encompass the execution of actual payments. This shift necessitates payment service providers to act as crucial infrastructure partners, ensuring secure and efficient transactions for AI agents. COOCON's involvement with the AAIF is therefore anticipated to reinforce its standing as a foundational infrastructure provider in the AI agent era, spanning both payment and data domains.
COOCON currently operates a substantial payment infrastructure network, supporting 2 million QR merchants, 100,000 franchise partners, and 40,000 ATMs. The company has also integrated with major global payment networks, including UnionPay, WeChat Pay, Alipay+, and Indonesia’s national QR payment standard, QRIS, enhancing its domestic and international payment capabilities. Furthermore, COOCON manages a business data platform that connects data from approximately 500 domestic institutions and 2,000 financial institutions across more than 40 countries, utilising over 300 APIs. The firm is now transitioning towards an MCP-based architecture to optimise data utilisation by AI systems.
Kim Jong-hyun, CEO of COOCON, stated that this participation marks a significant milestone for the company's global expansion efforts, coinciding with the establishment of its Singapore subsidiary. He emphasised that through technological exchange and collaboration within the AAIF, COOCON aims to strengthen its competitiveness in payment and data technologies, proactively responding to the emerging AI agent era. The company plans to leverage its AAIF activities as a strategic foundation to evolve into an AI-based data company, creating new growth opportunities in the global market, with a focus on global payments, stablecoins, and AI-based data businesses this year.