Kong Becoming Machine Commerce Checkout
Augusto Marietti, CEO of Kong, on the end of tokenmaxxing
The real prize is not better API plumbing, it is becoming the checkout and control layer for machine to machine commerce. Kong is arguing that if it already sits in front of millions of enterprise APIs, MCP servers, and agent calls, it can hide the messy parts of access, authentication, usage tracking, and billing, then let agents buy and use those services through one system instead of hundreds of separate vendor setups.
-
This only works after controlling supply first. Kong started as an API marketplace in 2010, but the first version failed because long tail APIs were unreliable and buyers still had to fetch separate API keys from each provider. The current strategy flips that around by owning the runtime layer first, then adding the marketplace on top.
-
The product stack is being built for that role. Kong now spans API gateway, MCP gateway, and agent gateway, and added OpenMeter in September 2025 to meter usage, set prices, enforce limits, and connect billing to the same traffic it already governs. That makes marketplace coordination concrete, not just a directory of APIs.
-
The closest analogs show the business model split. OpenRouter and Cloudflare already simplify multi model access through one interface and unified billing, but they mostly aggregate consumption. Kong is aiming deeper inside the enterprise, where the harder problem is exposing internal systems safely enough that agents can call them across HR, finance, support, and engineering workflows.
If Kong keeps expanding from gateway into system of record, the next step is turning internal API inventory into an agent ready network. That would move the company from selling infrastructure seats and contracts to taking a position in the flow of agent transactions themselves, which is a much bigger and more durable layer of the stack.