Stripe and Paradigm jointly incubated the payment public chain Tempo mainnet launches, simultaneously introducing the "AI Machine Payment Protocol."

Founded by renowned venture capital firm Paradigm and payments giant Stripe, the payment infrastructure Tempo officially launches its mainnet. Tempo also introduces the “Machine Payments Protocol (MPP),” developed in collaboration with Stripe, aiming to provide a low-latency, predictable fee payment network for the booming AI Agents. Currently, the project has attracted global giants such as Visa, Mastercard, OpenAI, and Shopify to join its ecosystem.
(Background recap: Stripe x Paradigm’s child testnet Tempo is live—worth interacting with?)
(Additional background: Stripe announces acquisition of crypto wallet Valora, aiming to promote the stablecoin network Tempo)

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• Designed for “AI Agents”: Solving traditional payment pain points
• Innovative “Sessions” mechanism: OAuth authorization for funds
• Backed by global giants: Visa, Mastercard, OpenAI all on board

At the intersection of cryptocurrency payments and artificial intelligence (AI), a heavyweight player has officially entered the scene. The blockchain infrastructure Tempo, incubated jointly by crypto venture giant Paradigm and payments leader Stripe, announced on March 18 that its mainnet is live, aiming to provide underlying infrastructure for internet-scale physical payments and AI machine economies.

Designed for “AI Agents”: Solving traditional payment pain points

In its announcement, Tempo’s team pointed out that while stablecoins have become a core layer of internet commerce, existing blockchains are not designed for large-scale payment workloads, with high fee volatility and throughput limitations remaining major obstacles. Especially with the rise of “AI Agents,” these digital proxies need to autonomously program, high-frequency, small-amount payments for various services (such as purchasing computing power, accessing data, or calling APIs).

To meet this demand, Tempo introduced the “Machine Payments Protocol (MPP),” an open standard co-developed with Stripe. MPP enables AI agents and services to coordinate payments automatically, completing requests, authorizations, and settlements without manual intervention.

Innovative “Sessions” mechanism: OAuth authorization for funds

Tempo introduces a new primitive called “Sessions,” similar to OAuth authorization in software. Users only need to authorize once, allowing AI agents to make continuous payments within defined limits. Thousands of microtransactions can be aggregated into a single on-chain settlement, making true “pay-per-use” feasible at internet scale.

Backed by global giants: Visa, Mastercard, OpenAI all on board

Tempo’s ecosystem demonstrates impressive appeal, with deep collaborations already in place:

• Payment giants: Visa has extended MPP to support card payments on its network; Mastercard, Revolut, and Nubank are exploring shifting global disbursements and cross-border remittances to Tempo.
• AI leaders: Providers like OpenAI and Anthropic are leveraging this infrastructure to enable AI to autonomously handle payments.
• Business platforms: Shopify, DoorDash, and payment tool providers like Ramp are testing embedded finance solutions with Tempo.

Additionally, Tempo’s “Payment Catalog” launched with over 100 services, including developer tools like Alchemy and Dune Analytics. Developers can now build directly on the Tempo mainnet via public RPC nodes.