​

Introduction

The Model Context Protocol (MCP) has been rapidly emerging as one of the dominant standards enabling agents to talk to external tools and services. Key players in AI, Anthropic, OpenAI, and Google have publicly announced their support for the protocol. MCP promises to do for AI agents what USB-C accomplished for device connectivity—it aims to establish a non-proprietary standard that enables seamless interaction between AI and other applications. If widely embraced, it could supercharge the adoption of AI.

Adoption, however, isn’t just a technical challenge. Software providers creating MCP servers face strategic questions around monetization, user experience, brand control, authentication, and permissions. This post explores MCP’s business implications for B2B and B2C companies, examines its potential to spark new agentic solutions, and analyzes what incentives companies have—or don’t have—to jump aboard.

​

How MCP-Enabled Services Work

Before diving into benefits and challenges, it helps to visualize where MCP slots into the AI tech stack. Let’s first look at it from a use-case lens.

​

For a B2B Company

Rachel is an e-commerce store owner who uses Stripe Checkout for online payments. She wants to add more products and their respective prices to the catalog. Previously, she would go to the Stripe website and add products and prices one by one. With Claude agentic flows connecting to Stripe’s MCP server, she can now open Claude Desktop and ask Claude to create these in her Stripe account. Claude talks to Stripe’s MCP Server to create the products.

​

For a B2C Company

Rachel wants to play Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us” on Spotify. Previously, she would open her Spotify app, search for the song, and then click play. With a Claude agentic flow and Spotify’s MCP server, she asks Claude Desktop to play it. Claude Desktop locates a local MCP Server for Spotify, but it realizes Rachel hasn’t authenticated her account yet. Claude Desktop opens a browser for her to authenticate, allowing Rachel to authorize the app to access her Spotify account. Once authenticated, Claude Desktop uses the local MCP Server to first find the song in Spotify’s catalog and then play it on the laptop.
Note: The MCP Server needs to be running on the desktop here to play music locally.

​

Current State of MCP

While the above examples paint a promising picture, they prove challenging to fully realize in practice because the existing MCP servers do not support these use cases. Regarding the first example, the official Stripe MCP Server currently supports authentication using only API keys. The user experience is not as seamless as the example would suggest— a business owner would potentially need IT support to set up the integration locally. In the second example, there is no official Spotify MCP Server. A community-created server exists that Rachel could install if she knows how to code, but a user would have to trust that the unverified MCP server is functioning as intended without any nefarious activity.

The MCP ecosystem remains in its infancy. Among nearly 4,000 MCP servers, fewer than 200 are officially company-released. Current adoption is limited to tech-savvy developers and select enterprises, mostly within Silicon Valley. True potential will only be unlocked when adoption expands beyond developers to mainstream enterprise use and eventually non-developer use.

We went through various online catalogs to find MCP servers and implementations. Here’s what we found:

• Most MCP servers are community-created, wrapping provider APIs, and are not official.
• An overwhelming majority of MCP servers are for developers.
• Only a handful of these MCP servers are B2B software providers.
• Stripe, PayPal, and Xero provide MCP servers that allow the user to create products, send invoices, etc. Others, like the Shopify MCP Server, only offer tools for ingesting developer documentation.
• Of the B2C MCP servers that exist, they primarily are for web search and file storage services.
• Almost all implementations are still MCP v0.1, so there is currently very little adoption of MCP v0.2.

​

Business Value

Most current discussions about MCP adoption focus on the technical perspective, yet a key question remains: Is there net new value being generated by MCP? For MCP to be successful, there need to be many robust MCP servers offered. What are the incentives for the software provider players in the ecosystem to participate?

​

Developer Centric Start

Early MCP adoption has been developer-centric. Developers are integrating MCP tools into their Integrated Developer Environments (IDEs) like Cursor or Windsurf with the goal of making software development more efficient. For example, an indie developer might want to clone or get inspired by a website they like for a client. They can use the Official Firecrawl MCP server to load the website styling into their own code. However, few official MCP servers exist. Two compelling examples are:

• Shopify-dev: Allows your coding copilot to fetch documentation and write informed code.
• MongoDB Atlas: Enables developers to manage database infrastructure right inside their IDE.

​

B2B Perspective

B2B adoption appears poised as MCP’s next frontier. For API-first companies like Stripe and PayPal, MCP represents a natural extension of their service APIs—adding a valuable distribution channel for agentic workflows without changing core offerings. Early adopters may gain a competitive advantage, potentially attracting agentic startups based solely on MCP availability, thus expanding the company’s market. In the Stripe example, as agentic companies are being created, these companies could choose Stripe as their payments provider solely because of their MCP offering where competitors lack one.

Comparing traditional API integration with MCP implementation, one key value-add is that LLM-powered assistants like Claude Desktop might provide a singular interface to consume services. This reduction in integration costs unlocks the ability to perform business workflows (e.g., client invoicing, catalog management, vendor tool use, etc.) within a single app.

However, significant trade-offs exist. For providers offering MCP-enabled services, server implementation demands several sprints’ worth of engineering resources amid limited tooling and evolving standards. These companies risk diminished control over user experience and potentially lower customer switching costs. For product-led growth companies, agent-based access might also reduce viral product adoption. Despite these challenges, MCP-enabled B2B services warrant close attention as agentic automation reshapes enterprise workflows.

​

B2C Perspective

B2C companies face unique considerations with MCP adoption. Currently, no consumer-facing companies (other than search tools or file sharing servers) maintain official public MCP servers—and for good reason. When agents access products through MCP, companies risk losing direct customer relationships, brand visibility, and control over product experience. They may also sacrifice valuable customer data and appear less differentiated from competitors, particularly when MCP endpoints facilitate direct interactions between their customers and competing services.

The financial stakes are particularly high for companies with ad-based revenue streams. MCP implementation can directly divert consumers’ advertising views, resulting in a loss of advertising opportunities and customer insights, potentially cannibalizing existing revenue streams. Nevertheless, potential benefits include reduced consumer friction through chat-based interfaces, broader distribution, and new revenue opportunities. MCP could streamline purchasing processes and open new discovery avenues for products and services.

​

What’s Missing?

While MCP’s recent release of v0.2 included some much-improved functionality, such as the introduction of authentication, significant limitations remain. For example:

• Customers need to have existing subscriptions before they can use services, and they still must sign up for those services in a traditional manner.
• It is unclear which service the agent should call if multiple MCP servers provide the same tools.

Functionality could be enhanced by extending MCP to include features such as error codes, redirects, etc. for payment, but the protocol currently lacks this built-in capability—potentially limiting its practical usability and appeal across a broader range of businesses.

Emerging players are trying to fill these gaps by developing MCP bridges, observability tools, gateways, auditability solutions, and more. They aim to address questions such as how to manage and administer multiple MCP servers, track usage for complex services, and block bad actors.

​

Conclusion

Strategically, businesses must weigh MCP’s benefits against potential costs and disruptions—it’s not just about if but also when. While MCP offers clear efficiencies, particularly in enterprise contexts, significant hurdles around branding, data ownership, and monetization persist.

Looking forward, widespread MCP adoption hinges on resolving both business value and technical questions. The MCP ecosystem is only in its infancy and will likely evolve significantly, shaped by both innovative startups and cautious incumbents. Companies that strategically position themselves now—either as providers or consumers of MCP-enabled services—stand to benefit from the current enthusiasm, even though the source of true long-term value remains less clear.

​

Get Connected, Share, and Other Socials

This article was co-authored with Adria Hou. You can find her on LinkedIn here.