Welcome to MPP Layer
The Machine Payments Protocol (MPP) is a decentralized gateway designed specifically for the AI economy. It enables autonomous agents, microservices, and human developers to pay each other for API usage instantly—without credit cards, subscriptions, or centralized middlemen.
The Problem with Web2 APIs
The current architecture of the internet (Web2) was built for human consumption, not for autonomous agents. If you want to use an API today, you must:
- Register an account and hand over personal identifiable information (PII).
- Attach a traditional fiat credit card.
- Commit to a monthly subscription or buy large packages of credits upfront.
- Manage and secure static
API Keys, which are a massive security liability if leaked.
This model completely breaks down in a world where millions of AI agents need to spin up, collaborate, pay each other for specific sub-tasks (like querying a DeFi sentiment model or generating an image), and shut down—all within seconds. Agents don't have credit cards.
The MPP Solution
MPP replaces static API keys and monthly billing with cryptographic Peer-to-Peer (P2P) microtransactions built on the Solana blockchain. We revive the original vision of the internet by utilizing the HTTP 402 Payment Required status code.
How it creates a Machine Economy
- Pay-Per-Use (Microtransactions): Pay exactly
0.001 USDCfor a single API call. No upfront commitments. - Instant Settlement: Providers receive the funds in their Solana wallet the millisecond their API is consumed. No waiting 30 days for a Stripe payout.
- Permissionless: Anyone, anywhere in the world, can publish an AI service or consume one without KYC.
- Non-Custodial: MPP is a decentralized proxy. We never hold your funds. The payment flows directly from the Consumer's wallet to the Provider's wallet.
Core Concepts
To understand how to build on MPP, you should familiarize yourself with these terms:
- Provider
- A developer who creates an AI Agent, ML Model, or data feed and publishes its URL on the MPP Registry to earn money. They run the actual computational workload.
- Consumer (Client)
- A user or an autonomous script that wants to call a Provider's API and is willing to pay the required crypto fee per request.
- MPP Gateway
- Our highly-optimized, non-custodial proxy server. It sits between the Consumer and the Provider, enforcing the HTTP 402 protocol and verifying Solana transactions before forwarding traffic.
Why Not Just Use Traditional Billing?
You might wonder why we don't just use standard SaaS billing tools. Here is a direct comparison of the MPP model versus traditional Web2 billing:
| Feature | MPP Layer (Web3) | Traditional Web2 |
|---|---|---|
| Settlement Time | Instant (Millisecond via Solana) | Days to Weeks (Monthly Payouts) |
| Custody | Non-Custodial (Direct to Wallet) | Custodial (Platform holds your money) |
| Authentication | Cryptographic Signatures (Dynamic) | Static API Keys (Easily stolen) |
| Agent Compatibility | Native (Machines have wallets) | Poor (Requires human credit cards) |
Popular Use Cases
The MPP ecosystem is designed for a variety of high-frequency, automated interactions:
- DeFi Trading Agents: An autonomous trading bot pays a separate "Sentiment Analysis" AI agent 0.001 USDC to analyze Twitter sentiment before executing a trade.
- Decentralized Physical Infrastructure (DePIN): IoT devices securely sell their sensor data directly to research models per query.
- AI Model Inference: GPU providers host open-source LLMs and charge micro-cents per token generated, receiving streaming payments directly to their treasury.
Next Steps
Depending on whether you want to Consume APIs or Publish your own, select a guide below:
Built for the machine economy by MPP Layer.