Amazon Blocks Meta's AI 'Muse'... Battle for Control of AI Agents

[Financial News, New York—Lee Byung-chul, correspondent] The world's largest e-commerce company, Amazon, has blocked Meta's artificial intelligence (AI) agent Muse. The move prevents Muse from accessing Amazon on users' behalf to search for and purchase products. Muse, which sparked a sensation by reaching No. 1 on the U.S. App Store just two weeks after its launch, has encountered an unexpected barrier. As the era of AI agents that browse the internet and handle shopping and various tasks for people begins, competition among big tech companies to control customers and data is also intensifying.
According to The Wall Street Journal on the 23rd local time, Amazon recently blocked Muse's access to its shopping site and its ability to purchase products. Amazon said Meta had not notified it of Muse's access in advance and that it had never approved it. An Amazon spokesperson emphasized that third-party applications must operate transparently when purchasing products from other businesses on behalf of customers, and that the service provider's decision on whether to participate must also be respected.
Analysts say Amazon's decision also reflects interests tied to its advertising business. If AI agents handle everything from product searches to purchases, consumers will have less need to visit Amazon's website themselves. From Amazon's perspective, this could reduce not only product sales but also opportunities to show advertisements to consumers.
Josh Beck, an analyst at Raymond James, said most internet marketplaces either already have large advertising businesses or plan to build them. He analyzed that access to external websites could become a "major bottleneck" in the spread of AI agents. Meta currently has partnerships with Shopify, Instacart and Dick's Sporting Goods.
Despite Amazon's pushback, Muse's early performance has been strong. Muse, launched by Meta on the 8th, has been downloaded more than 2.5 million times since its release and reached No. 1 on Apple's U.S. App Store. Amid the excitement, Meta's stock price jumped 11% in a single day on Monday. Truist Securities estimated that Muse could generate an additional $28.5 billion in revenue for Meta by 2030.
Privacy, however, is another barrier. Muse becomes more useful the more access it has to email, text messages and calendars. An Oppenheimer survey found that only 8% of U.S. consumers said they could entrust Meta with their passwords. The figure for Google was 30%.
Competition is also expected to intensify soon. The market expects OpenAI to unveil a consumer AI agent within the next one to two weeks, while Google and Apple are also expected to enter the race. Yusef Squali, an analyst at Truist Securities, noted, "Give Google and OpenAI just a few weeks, and they can create something similar to anything currently on the market."




[email protected] Lee Byung-chul, correspondent Reporter