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Holding·last review24 May 2026

The three open agent protocols active in 2026 (Anthropic's Model Context Protocol, Google's Agent2Agent protocol contributed to the Linux Foundation, and Meta's Llama Stack) are not on a convergence trajectory, and the four major proprietary agentic platforms (Microsoft Copilot Agent, Salesforce Agentforce, SAP Joule, ServiceNow Now Assist) do not adopt any of the three as first-class defaults. The cost of being wrong on the model choice is low because swapping models is a configuration change. The cost of being wrong on the protocol choice is high because the locked asset is the tool inventory — the MCP servers, A2A endpoints, Llama Stack tool plugins, or proprietary extensions the customer has built or commissioned — and re-platforming the tool inventory is the long-tail engineering bill. Standard 2026 agentic AI MSAs do not include the three procurement clauses (protocol portability disclosure, tool inventory exit terms, protocol-roadmap commitment) that would price the protocol-roadmap optionality back to the customer.

Claim is scoped to the protocol-lock-in dimension of the 2026 enterprise agentic AI procurement decision. Does not assert the protocols are technically inferior or superior to one another — asserts that the fragmentation creates re-platform cost that most procurement processes are not modelling. 60-day review cadence. Trigger conditions: (1) MCP, A2A, and Llama Stack publish a converged or interoperable spec — would move toward Partial because the protocol fragmentation is closing structurally; (2) one of the four major proprietary platforms (Microsoft, Salesforce, SAP, ServiceNow) adopts MCP or A2A as a first-class default — would shift the lock-in calculus materially and reduce the per-platform tool-wrapper cost; (3) a published 2026 enterprise re-platform with a cost figure attached — would empirically anchor the 'tool inventory is the locked asset' argument; (4) an OWASP, NIST, or ENISA control set on agent-protocol risk — would change the audit picture and likely accelerate adoption of the three procurement clauses; (5) Llama Stack ecosystem growth (server count, library count, third-party tool support) reaching parity with MCP — would change the picking calculus for self-hosted-aligned customers.

Published
24 May 2026
Last reviewed
24 May 2026
Next review
+35d· 23 Jul 2026
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The claim: The three open agent protocols active in 2026 (Anthropic's Model Context Protocol, Google's Agent2Agent protocol contributed to the Linux Foundation, and Meta's Llama Stack) are not on a convergence trajectory, and the four major proprietary agentic platforms (Microsoft Copilot Agent, Salesforce Agentforce, SAP Joule, ServiceNow Now Assist) do not adopt any of the three as first-class defaults. The cost of being wrong on the model choice is low because swapping models is a configuration change. The cost of being wrong on the protocol choice is high because the locked asset is the tool inventory — the MCP servers, A2A endpoints, Llama Stack tool plugins, or proprietary extensions the customer has built or commissioned — and re-platforming the tool inventory is the long-tail engineering bill. Standard 2026 agentic AI MSAs do not include the three procurement clauses (protocol portability disclosure, tool inventory exit terms, protocol-roadmap commitment) that would price the protocol-roadmap optionality back to the customer.

About this register

The Reporting register tracks claims published from articles addressed to senior enterprise IT leaders — CIOs, IT directors, heads of platform. Claims are reviewed on a 30–90 day cadence; each review either reaffirms the claim, marks one substantive part as Partial, or marks it Not holding once the underlying evidence has been overtaken.

Recent corrections in Reporting

  • AM-008 · Partial · 17 Jun 2026

    Source-text figure re-review: Google's 2024 Environmental Report reports a 28% year-over-year increase to 8.1 billion gallons, not the 33% (from a 6.1 billion 2023 base) asserted at publish. The 8.1B 2024 figure and the Microsoft WUE 0.30 L/kWh / 39%-improvement figure are unchanged and verified. Article corrected to 28% and the unsupported 6.1B base removed; the claim text retains the original figure with this correction per the Holding-up protocol.

  • AM-132 · Partial · 10 Jun 2026

    One of four legs unanchored on re-review. The claim text attributes '12% of deployments clearing 300%+ ROI with 88% at or below break-even at 12-18 months' to the Stanford DEL 2026 Enterprise AI Playbook. Full-text verification on 10 Jun 2026 found no such figure in that source: the playbook (Pereira, Graylin, Brynjolfsson, Apr 2026) studies 51 successful deployments by design and contains no ROI distribution, no 300%-plus cohort, and no break-even measurement point (full finding at AM-029, correction of 10 Jun 2026). The only verified figure carrying the same 12/88 numerals is IDC research with Lenovo (via CIO.com, Mar 2025): roughly 88% of AI proof-of-concepts never reach production and roughly 12% graduate — a pilot-to-production graduation metric, not an ROI distribution. The Gartner 28%, McKinsey 23%/17%, and MIT NANDA 95% legs verify; they support a small high-performing tail and a large struggling body, but none documents the two-peak bimodal shape the claim asserts. Status Up -> Partial.

  • AM-129 · Partial · 10 Jun 2026

    One of three read-against anchors unanchored on re-review. The claim text cites 'Stanford Digital Economy Lab Enterprise AI Playbook (12/88 bimodal ROI distribution at 12-18 months)' and frames the realistic ROI band around 'the highest-discipline 12% cohort'. Full-text verification on 10 Jun 2026 found the playbook contains no 12/88 distribution, no bimodal ROI shape, and no 12-18-month ROI measurement point (full finding at AM-029, correction of 10 Jun 2026). The claim's core negative finding — no mid-market enterprise has produced a documented +240% ROI in 90 days under audited conditions — is unaffected; the McKinsey State of AI 2025 and MIT NANDA legs verify and continue to support it. The '12% cohort' framing has no verifiable referent. The only verified figure carrying the 12/88 numerals is IDC's pilot-graduation finding (roughly 88% of AI proof-of-concepts never reach production; via CIO.com, Mar 2025), a different metric. Status Up -> Partial.

Reviews coming up in Reporting

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    AI agents executing financial transactions need a four-control bundle (action-approval gates by blast radius, kill-swit…

  • AM-061 · Holding · next +9d (27 Jun 2026)

    Production agentic-AI costs at scale routinely run multiples of POC projections, and a layered optimisation programme c…

  • AM-003 · Partial · next +9d (27 Jun 2026)

    GPT-5 Pro's tiered-subscription model forces enterprises to classify problems by computational difficulty — $200/month…