Visa Launches ‘Agentic Ready’ AI Payments Program in Asia-Pacific With Six South Korean Partners

Visa on April 30 officially launched Visa Agentic Ready, an Asia-Pacific program designed to support an artificial intelligence-based payments ecosystem.

The program is intended to prepare for the coming era of agentic commerce, a new form of commerce in which AI agents initiate and complete payments on behalf of consumers.

In its initial phase, the program will focus on strengthening issuers’ technical readiness. Participating issuers will test and validate AI agent-led transactions in a controlled environment designed to mirror real-world operations. That process is intended to help them better understand new payment flows and assess their own security and infrastructure capabilities.

Major South Korean card issuers and internet-only banks have also joined the initiative to build the new payments ecosystem. In South Korea, the partners are KB Kookmin Card, Samsung Card, Shinhan Card, KakaoBank, Hana Card and Hyundai Card. Visa plans to keep expanding the partner roster through this year.

Visa Agentic Ready draws on Visa’s core network capabilities, including tokenization, identity verification and risk management. Its goal is to create an environment in which AI agents can carry out transactions smoothly and securely while keeping consumers firmly in control. The program is part of Visa’s broader Visa Intelligent Commerce strategy, its portfolio of AI-driven commerce solutions.

South Korea and the broader Asia-Pacific region offer an ideal environment for agentic commerce because digital payments technology is already highly advanced, Patrick Story, president of Visa Korea, said. He added that the program will help issuers learn about and prepare for agent-based payments early, giving the industry a key foundation for innovation built on trust.