Could Agentforce 3’s MCP integration push Salesforce ahead in the CRM AI race?

Salesforce’s introduction of MCP and A2A capabilities to Agentforce could push it ahead of the competition in the CRM market, according to analysts.
 
“Their implementation of MCP is one of the most ambitious interoperability moves we have seen from a CRM vendor or any vendor. It positions Agentforce as a central nervous system for multi-agent orchestration, not just within Salesforce but across the enterprise,” said Dion Hinchcliffe, lead of the CIO practice at The Futurum Group.

Rivals such as HubSpot and Microsoft haven’t gone this deep on open protocols, Hinchcliffe said. “Salesforce is betting big on agentic composability, and for now, they’re out front.”

Key to Salesforce’s success in the integration of agent interoperability frameworks is the introduction of agent gateway — a tool that sits in the Agent Builder inside Agentforce, according to Brian Landsman, CEO of Salesforce AppExchange.

“The agent gateway is going to allow you (enterprise users) to provide governance effectively and administration around all of those registered MCP or A2A experiences. If you’re an admin, you can make sure that you’re managing the MCP server or multiple of them appropriately,” Landsman said.

While Salesforce is not stopping enterprises from using an MCP server, for security reasons, it suggests using the MCP servers it has listed on the AgentExchange — currently about 35, including from partners such as AWS, Box, Cisco, Google Cloud, IBM, Notion, PayPal, Stripe, Teradata, and Writer.

But there is a caveat to this. The liability for the security of MCP servers hosted on the AgentExchange will be directly borne by the vendors listing them.

Futurum’s Hinchcliffe sees Salesforce’s implementation of MCP-related security as a double-edged sword. “Delegating security to vendors via AgentExchange enables scale, but it also introduces risk fragmentation. Enterprise buyers will want assurances that Salesforce enforces policy guardrails, not just performs vendor vetting,” Hinchcliffe said.

“Other CRM vendors like Microsoft tend to favor vertically integrated trust models, which simplify governance but reduce choice,” Hinchcliffe added.

Salesforce, for now, seems focused on scale. According to Landsman, the agent gateway is being further designed in such a way that it recommends users certain MCP servers when building a multi-agent system. He said it is being designed so that users subscribe to the vendor whose MCP server is required to be used by the agent from within Agentforce or AgentExchange.

This approach, according to Hinchcliffe, is a classic long-term play for agent monetization and ecosystem lock-in.

“Agentforce 3 doesn’t just improve agent tooling, it lays the groundwork for a composable economy of digital labor, where customers, partners, and ISVs contribute and consume agentic functionality inside Salesforce,” Hinchcliffe said.

“If successful, it will redraw Salesforce’s boundaries into the largest possible TAM and reshape the future of enterprise software from SaaS to Agents-as-a-Service,” Hinchcliffe added.

Ability to turn an API into an MCP server

Agentforce now has the ability to turn any API into an MCP server using MuleSoft connectors, as well as the ability to package and expose internal Agentforce agents as MCP-compliant services using Heroku AppLink.

According to Hinchcliffe, the Heroku integration is important for enterprises as it brings DevOps maturity and infrastructure abstraction to agent deployment.

“For enterprises that need to operationalize custom logic fast, without deep Kubernetes expertise, Heroku plus MCP is the shortcut. It’s especially strategic for organizations trying to align developer-built tools with low-code Agentforce workflows,” Hinchcliffe said.

“Also, it’s a big deal for enterprises that have lots of legacy Java they will want to pull into and use in an Agentforce context,” Hinchcliffe added. The MuleSoft MCP and A2A support, the support for Heorku Applink, and Agentforce native MCP support will be made generally available in July.