Overview

UCP Hub is a multi-tenant SaaS platform that implements the Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) — a protocol backed by companies like Google and Shopify, designed to let businesses expose standardized commerce profiles that can be consumed by AI agents and platforms.

In simple terms, UCP allows:

• AI agents to search catalogs
• Create carts
• Create checkout sessions
• Place orders
• And interact with stores using a standardized, protocol-defined interface

UCP Hub’s goal is to make this easy and scalable for real businesses by providing:

• A production-ready UCP core implementation
• A connector system for platforms like WooCommerce (and others in the future)
• A dashboard for managing stores and integrations
• A UCP-compliant AI platform for testing and demos
• A multi-tenant SaaS architecture for teams and organizations

I am the technical lead and primary developer of the project, responsible for architecture, backend, frontend, and product direction.

What is the Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP)?

UCP is a protocol designed to standardize how commerce systems expose their capabilities to AI platforms and agents.

It defines:

• How a store exposes its profile
• How catalogs are queried
• How carts and checkouts are created
• What headers, formats, and flows must be supported
• How platforms should interact with businesses in a consistent way

UCP Hub implements this protocol in a way that lets existing commerce platforms (like WooCommerce today) become UCP-compatible with minimal setup.

The Product

UCP Hub is built around three main pillars:

1. UCP Core (inside the API)
2. Transport Layers
3. Connector System

1. UCP Core

The UCP core is the heart of the system. It:

• Implements the protocol’s business logic
• Validates requests and headers
• Transforms data between internal and protocol formats
• Enforces UCP-compliant flows
• Returns responses strictly following the protocol specification

This keeps the protocol logic isolated, testable, and extensible, independent of any specific commerce platform.

2. Transport Layers

The protocol supports multiple transport mechanisms. Currently, UCP Hub implements:

• REST transport

The architecture is designed to support future transports such as:

• MCP
• A2A
• Other protocol-defined transports

Each transport layer is a thin adapter that maps protocol requests into the UCP core and back out again.

3. Connector System

A connector represents a commerce platform that wants to expose a UCP profile.

Currently implemented:

• WooCommerce connector
• A WordPress plugin used to configure and authorize the connection

How it works:

1. A user registers in the UCP Hub dashboard
2. They create a store and a store integration
3. They receive:
   • A Store ID
   • An API key
4. They enter these into the WordPress plugin
5. They authorize UCP Hub to access their WooCommerce REST API
6. Their store now serves:
   • /.well-known/ucp
   • And becomes fully UCP-compliant

The connector system is designed so we can:

• Add more platforms (Wix, Shopify, custom stores, etc.)
• Even support custom commerce backends in the future

Demo Mode & AI Platform

Because the UCP ecosystem is still evolving, we built:

• A UCP-compliant AI platform (agent)
• A demo WordPress store with dummy products
• A demo mode inside the dashboard

This allows users to:

• Test UCP flows end-to-end
• Validate their integrations
• Experiment with AI-driven commerce interactions
• Try UCP even before the ecosystem is fully live

The AI platform itself is fully UCP-compliant and communicates with any UCP-enabled store.

Architecture

High-level system components:

• API (NestJS / Node.js)

  • UCP Core
  • Transport layers
  • Connector system
  • Multi-tenant org, store, and integration management
  • Auth, sessions, API keys

• Dashboard (Next.js)

  • Authentication & authorization
  • Organization & store management
  • Integration setup
  • Demo mode & testing tools
  • Admin panel for super-admin users

• WordPress Plugin

  • Handles store-side configuration
  • Authorization flow
  • Store identity & credentials
  • Bridges WooCommerce to UCP Hub

• AI Platform

  • Built using Vercel AI SDK
  • Acts as a UCP-compliant platform
  • Used for demos, testing, and validation

Phase 1 — UCP Hub MVP

Phase 1 focused on:

• Implementing the UCP core
• Shipping the REST transport
• Building the WooCommerce connector
• Creating the WordPress plugin
• Building the Next.js dashboard
• Adding demo mode + AI platform
• Delivering a fully working, end-to-end UCP system

This phase resulted in a production-grade foundation that can evolve with the protocol.

Phase 2 & Beyond — Protocol Evolution & Platform Expansion

As the UCP spec evolves, UCP Hub is designed to:

• Stay fully compliant with new protocol versions
• Add new transport layers
• Add new connectors (Wix, other platforms, custom stores)
• Expand the AI platform capabilities
• Improve observability, tooling, and enterprise features

The long-term vision is to make UCP Hub the go-to integration layer between AI platforms and real commerce systems.

My Role

I am the technical lead and primary developer on UCP Hub.

My responsibilities include:

• Designing the overall system architecture
• Implementing:
  • The UCP core
  • The connector framework
  • The API (NestJS)
  • The Next.js dashboard
  • The AI platform
• Designing:
  • Multi-tenant org/store/integration model
  • Auth, sessions, and API key systems
  • Admin & super-admin tooling
• Leading a small team:
  • Researching the protocol
  • Breaking work into tasks
  • Planning and prioritizing features
  • Reviewing and guiding implementation

In practice, I’m responsible for product direction, backend architecture, frontend architecture, and delivery of the entire platform.

Tech Stack

• Backend: NestJS, Node.js, TypeScript
• Frontend: Next.js, React, TypeScript
• Database: PostgreSQL
• Infrastructure: Docker
• APIs: REST (with future transports planned)
• AI: Vercel AI SDK
• Auth: Custom auth, sessions, API keys
• Integrations: WordPress, WooCommerce

Closing Thoughts

UCP Hub is not “just another SaaS dashboard”.

It’s a protocol implementation, integration platform, and AI commerce playground combined into one system — designed to evolve alongside a new standard for AI-driven commerce.

For me, it’s been a chance to work at the intersection of:

• Protocol design
• Platform architecture
• SaaS product engineering
• AI integrations
• And real-world commerce systems