Unlock AI Potential with Redpanda: Identity, Policy Control, and Data Governance for Intelligent Agents
Redpanda Enhances Agentic Data Plane for Secure AI Agent Connections
Enterprises can now securely connect artificial intelligence (AI) agents to live data using Redpanda’s enhanced Agentic Data Plane (ADP). The updated platform introduces a centralized AI gateway, AI observability and evaluation via OpenTelemetry, AI agents, and unified authentication and authorization. These features form a unified governance layer that provides visibility and control over AI agent interactions.
Governing AI Agents in Production
As organizations transition from AI experimentation to production, they face new challenges in governing AI agents. According to Tyler Akidau, CTO of Redpanda,
Redpanda’s solution addresses this challenge by providing a central point of control for all agent interactions.
Key Features of Redpanda ADP
The Redpanda ADP acts as both a governance layer and a control plane, governing how agents authenticate, access data, and take action while recording intent, inputs, and outputs for complete auditability. The platform’s AI Gateway provides a unified access layer between applications, AI models, and Model Context Protocol (MCP) services, centralizing routing, policy enforcement, cost controls, and observability across all AI traffic.
- Enterprises can define token budgets, set spending limits, and optimize usage through deferred tool loading, bringing operational discipline to complex agent workflows.
- The AI Gateway also serves as a central point to aggregate and govern MCP servers, with an admin-controlled registry of approved servers and YAML-based configuration for rapid deployment.
Compatibility and Observability
Redpanda’s ADP is designed to work with any AI agent framework, allowing enterprises to run and govern agents built on their existing frameworks or use Redpanda’s built-in AI agents. All agents interact with data and tools through open standards like the A2A protocol and integrate with ADP’s unified authentication, authorization, and observability services.
The platform provides end-to-end observability and evaluation, emitting full-fidelity metrics, traces, logs, and transcripts using the OpenTelemetry Protocol (OTLP). Enterprises can inspect agent behavior directly in the Redpanda console or export traces to external observability platforms, enabling debugging, compliance, and post-incident analysis.
Industry Validation
Redpanda’s approach addresses the need for strong AI governance and real-time data inputs, according to Kevin Petrie, VP Research and Head of Data Management Practice of BARC.
Conclusion
With the enhanced Redpanda ADP, enterprises can now operate agentic systems safely, with identity, policy enforcement, and observability built-in from day one. As Alex Gallego, founder and CEO of Redpanda, noted,
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