Synchrony Financial, a leading credit card issuer for major brands including Amazon, Walmart, and Lowe’s, has partnered with OpenAI to bring shopping directly into the popular AI chatbot ChatGPT.

This groundbreaking collaboration is one of the first major moves by a U.S. consumer lender to integrate financing, payments, and rewards into an AI chatbot, paving the way for a new era of online shopping.

According to Maran Nalluswami, Synchrony’s chief strategy officer, the integration of payments into ChatGPT will likely take six to 12 months to complete, with the possibility of longer timelines for private label store cards that only work at specific retailers.

The partnership between Synchrony and OpenAI marks a significant step towards realizing the promise of agentic commerce, where consumers can discover and purchase products within an AI agent without being redirected to a brand’s website.

OpenAI has already signed deals with companies like Visa and Stripe to facilitate in-chat purchases, but the challenge lies in ensuring that transactions are seamless and secure within the ChatGPT ecosystem.

Nalluswami emphasized that Synchrony wants to ‘ensure that if a transaction’s going to happen in that ecosystem, our cards are loaded up in the right spots to ensure that that transaction finishes.’ This requires close coordination with OpenAI and other stakeholders to develop a robust and user-friendly payment system.

However, there are still concerns about consumer trust and the economics of transactions completed within ChatGPT. Nalluswami noted that the ‘economics will need to be negotiated among retailers, Synchrony and OpenAI,’ highlighting the complexity of this emerging market.

As OpenAI prepares for its massive potential initial public offering, the company is under pressure to turn ChatGPT into a broader platform for online commerce. Synchrony’s partnership with OpenAI is a significant step in this direction, with the company also exploring collaborations with competing AI platforms, including Anthropic’s Claude and Google’s Gemini.

In addition to this partnership, Synchrony is launching a ChatGPT plugin that allows consumers to browse its marketplace deals, promotional financing, and partner offers. The company is also deploying OpenAI’s latest models internally to speed up product development and improve the overall user experience.