A new commercial era needs a new curriculum. This is the programme that gives commercial leaders the frameworks, language, and strategy to compete when the buyer is a machine.

For more than a century, commercial strategy assumed a human at the other end of the transaction. That assumption is dissolving. AI agents are not only a tool that businesses use. They are increasingly the customer. They search, evaluate, compare, and purchase on behalf of human principals. They are, in effect, a procurement officer that never sleeps, carries no brand loyalty, and cannot be charmed.

AIO®-Commerce is the emerging commercial category that names this era. AIO®-Commerce is not an update to existing marketing practice. It is a structural rethink of how brands, retailers, and service businesses must be built, priced, and managed when the primary buyer is algorithmic. Selling to the Machine is the programme that teaches it.

Developed by Paul F. Accornero from his academic research programme and more than 25 years of global commercial operations experience, the curriculum spans twelve modules: from the first principles of agentic commerce to joint business planning, algorithmic pricing, brand management without human perception, and the governance frameworks required when machines transact at scale.

The Flagship Programme

Selling to the Machine

Commercial strategy, offer design, and brand management for the age when AI agents act as the primary purchasing decision-makers on behalf of human principals. Grounded in peer-reviewed academic research and three decades of global commercial operations experience, spanning revenue operations across four continents.

Modules
12
Format
Modular
Level
Executive
Delivery
Business Schools & Corporate

Typically delivered across a two- to three-day residential block, or as a modular series across a semester programme.

The Curriculum

Twelve modules. One cohesive playbook.

01
Commercial Excellence in the Algorithmic Age
The foundations: what changes, what stays, and why this is not incremental.
02
The Shopper Schism
The permanent structural separation of consumer and shopper when the buying function migrates to a machine.
03
The Machine Customer
Who you are now selling to: decision logic, principal-agent dynamics, and algorithmic selection criteria.
04
AIO-Commerce
The category, the discipline, and the strategic imperative for brands and retailers entering agent-mediated markets.
05
Algorithmic Readiness
The Four Ds Framework: Data Quality, Discoverability, Decision Clarity, and Delivery Reliability.
06
Agent Intent Optimisation
The discipline that succeeds SEO when the audience is a machine: how to be found, weighted, and chosen.
07
AI IS the Customer
Delegated purchasing at scale: what it means when AI makes the choice before the human ever knows an option existed.
08
Brand Management Without Human Perception
Rebuilding brand equity as machine-legible signal when the selecting agent has no eyes.
09
Pricing and Commercial Policy
Algorithmic pricing, joint business planning, and commercial policy for buyers that never sleep.
10
Retail Relationships in the Agentic Age
The structural reorganisation of brand-to-retailer relationships when the shopper is an algorithm.
11
Governance and Risk
The Governance Gauntlet: accountability, liability, and systemic risk when machines are the primary commercial counterparty.
12
Building the Playbook
Strategy, organisation design, and the capability build required to compete in AIO-Commerce markets.
Who This Is For

Built for leaders who have to deliver.

C-Suite Executives

The programme was designed for the executive who owns revenue and must rethink the entire go-to-market architecture when the buyer becomes a machine.

Business School Participants

For MBA and Executive MBA cohorts who need the frameworks, not the hype. AIO-Commerce is the commercial discipline for the next decade.

Senior Management Teams

Custom delivery for senior teams preparing for the agentic transition: commercial functions, business unit heads, and cross-functional leadership groups.

Delivery

Four ways to bring the programme in.

i
Business School Partnerships
Full programme or selected modules, delivered as part of an executive education curriculum. Offered as an open programme.
ii
Corporate In-House
Customised delivery for a single organisation, adapted to sector, maturity, and strategic context.
iii
Open Enrolment
For individual executives seeking the curriculum outside an institutional programme. Contact to discuss.
iv
Board Governance Track
A one-day governance module for boards and non-executive directors on oversight in the AIO-Commerce era.

The Instructor

Paul F. Accornero is the researcher who first established agentic commerce as a formal academic field, with work published in the California Management Review (FT50), Forbes, and AACSB Insights. He spent more than 25 years in the global C-suite of consumer goods companies, most recently as Group Chief Commercial Officer with P&L responsibility exceeding €3.5bn across more than 120 markets. He is the author of The Algorithmic Shopper (St. Martin’s Press, 2027) and the founder of The AI Praxis.

The curriculum draws directly on his academic research programme (25+ working papers on SSRN, top 2% of downloaded authors), his registered intellectual property portfolio, and his experience running €3.5bn+ revenue commercial operations across three decades and four continents. He is a guest lecturer at Harvard and an invited peer reviewer for the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science (FT50).

Bring Selling to the Machine to your institution.