The industry is moving toward a common specification to link multiple agents and external apps, with Google's A2A protocol now overseen by the Agentic AI Foundation (AAIF) under the Linux Foundation, to create an agent compatibility framework independent of any single company, enabling interoperable apps and AI agents.

AAIF includes OpenAI, Microsoft, and AWS, and aims to standardize how apps and AI agents operate together through shared standards rather than single-vendor solutions.

OpenAI is expanding ChatGPT plugins to connect with external services like Slack, Google Drive, and Calendar, and added a Mac plugin to automate Apple Messages reading, searching, composing, and sending.

OpenAI announced a 20% cut in input API prices and a 33% reduction for output tokens for GPT-5.6 Sol by November, aiming to lower costs as AI agents generate numerous API calls during task decomposition.

Hancom in Korea is developing Sovereign Agentic OS to orchestrate multiple AI agents and enterprise work systems, converting internal documents into AI-understandable data and planning a beta release in the second half of the year for public sector, finance, and Europe due to security and data sovereignty needs.

AI competition is expanding from model performance to building ecosystems that connect external apps and data, aiming to dominate agentic operating systems where AI autonomously finds information and executes tasks for users.

Anthropic is enhancing Claude’s connections to smartphones and apps, including iOS features (Messages, Mail, Calendar) and improved integration with Google Workspace to manage Gmail, Calendar events, and Drive files.