DENVER, CO (November 17, 2025) – Pax8, the leading cloud commerce Marketplace, today announced the launch of Pax8 Labs, its groundbreaking innovation arm dedicated to shaping the future of AI-powered services to benefit small and mid-sized businesses (SMBs) via Pax8’s partner community. Pax8 Labs’ charter is to make bold bets and investments in agent commerce, focusing on new initiatives that drive toward leadership in AI automation and implementation—starting with infrastructure for AI agent deployment.
In addition to Pax8’s core business focus on its proven, scalable Marketplace operations, Pax8 Labs is also designed to explore opportunities where the market does not yet fully exist – all with an eye on how to benefit SMB technology and agentic AI adoption. Both the core Marketplace and new, pioneering initiatives will evolve more quickly to support agents due to the work of AI Labs.
“Pax8 Labs is about building for the future,” said Libby McIlhany, Chief Product Officer at Pax8. “We believe MSPs are the key to bringing AI to millions of SMBs, and we’re investing and experimenting early to make that possible.”
Despite high adoption rates, 42% of SMBs lack the necessary resources and expertise to deploy AI effectively. Common hurdles include choosing the right tools (48%), data privacy concerns (46%), and technical skill gaps (41%), according to Goldman Sachs. AI is already transforming how businesses operate, but for millions of SMBs, adoption will depend on the managed service provider (MSP) channel, and the innovation that Pax8 creates to support this channel ecosystem.
MSPs want to deliver AI-powered services, yet today’s tools cannot handle the operational complexity of multi-tenant environments, cost attribution, and predictable economics. Pax8 Labs is tackling these challenges head-on through extensive research and development (R&D) that enables MSPs to profitably deploy AI agents across multiple clients. This includes:
- Multi-tenant orchestration: Securely running agents and workflows across the channel ecosystem.
- Automatic cost attribution: Tracking token consumption and API costs per client for accurate billing.
- Agent coordination: Preventing conflicts when multiple agents operate on shared data.
- Dynamic integration learning: Using LLMs to interact with arbitrary APIs without pre-built connectors.
- Predictive budgeting: Forecasting costs before execution so MSPs can price services confidently.
“We see MSPs transforming into providers of managed intelligence,” said Josh Dulberger, Senior Vice President of Pax8 Labs. “Our team is building the infrastructure that makes this evolution possible—enabling MSPs to deploy AI agents across hundreds of clients with predictable economics and measurable outcomes.”
Pax8 Labs will accelerate agent adoption across the Pax8 ecosystem, bringing enterprise-grade AI capabilities, such as the Microsoft Agent Framework, to channel partners, thereby driving intelligence into the SMB market. As Microsoft and others evolve their agent strategies, Labs will rapidly deliver what MSPs need to deploy them, from technical infrastructure to business model innovation.
About Pax8
Pax8 is the cloud commerce Marketplace of the future, linking partners, vendors, and small to mid-sized businesses (SMBs) through AI-powered insights and comprehensive product support. With a global partner ecosystem of over 47,000 managed service providers, Pax8 empowers SMBs worldwide by providing software and services that unlock their growth potential and enhance their security. Committed to innovating cloud commerce at scale, Pax8 drives customer acquisition and solution consumption across its entire ecosystem.
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Media Contact:
David Stephen
PR Manager
dstephen@pax8.com