HawkSearch collaborates with leading commerce innovators to develop open, interoperable standards for autonomous agents to guide merchants into the future of commerce.
WOBURN, MA / ACCESS Newswire / January 27, 2026 / HawkSearch, a leading AI-powered search, merchandising, and personalization platform for ecommerce, today announced it has joined the Agentic Commerce Alliance (ACA), the world’s only open initiative dedicated to ensuring agent-driven commerce remains accessible, secure, and beneficial for merchants of all sizes.
The Agentic Commerce Alliance brings together leading innovators to define how autonomous agents interact and collaborate in real commercial environments. As a member, HawkSearch will contribute its expertise in AI-driven product discovery, personalization, and merchandising intelligence to help develop open standards that enable trustworthy, interoperable agentic systems.
Commerce is entering a new phase. While AI has supported workflows through recommendations and predictions, a new generation of autonomous agents can now understand context, coordinate across systems, and carry out meaningful tasks on behalf of merchants and buyers. However, without shared standards and open interoperability, autonomous agents cannot operate safely and consistently across systems, channels, and workflows.
“Commerce is rapidly moving toward a future where autonomous agents play an active role in discovery, decision-making, and transactions,” said Ari Kahn, President and CEO of Bridgeline Digital. “By joining the Agentic Commerce Alliance, we’re bringing our deep experience in AI-powered search and personalization to help ensure these agents operate transparently and in ways that benefit merchants and shoppers alike. For our customers, this means greater control, better visibility, and new opportunities to compete and grow.”
The Agentic Commerce Alliance addresses this challenge by creating vendor-neutral, open standards that enable agents to work across platforms while respecting merchant control. The Alliance’s principles emphasize human-first trust, customer-centricity, vendor neutrality, openness by default, interoperability by design, and global accessibility.
The Agentic Commerce Alliance operates on principles of openness and shared intelligence. It was initiated by Shopware as a natural extension of years of open commerce architecture and applied AI development.
“Without open standards, discovery and choice risk being controlled by closed platforms. With them, agents can recognize trust, service, and expertise-ensuring merchants of all sizes remain visible, maintain direct customer relationships, and stay competitive,” said Stefan Hamann, CEO of Shopware and Agentic Commerce Alliance initiator.
About the Agentic Commerce Alliance
The Agentic Commerce Alliance unites AI commerce experts to guide merchants into the future of commerce. As the world’s only open initiative dedicated to shaping the technical, ethical, and operational foundations of agent-driven commerce, it ensures agentic commerce remains accessible, secure, and beneficial for businesses of all sizes.
Learn more at agentic-commerce.org
About Bridgeline
Bridgeline helps companies grow online revenue by increasing traffic, conversion rates, and average order value. To learn more, visit http://www.bridgeline.com.
Contact:
Jeremy LaDuque
SVP of Marketing
Bridgeline Digital
[email protected]
SOURCE: Bridgeline Digital
