CIIB-003: The Runtime Went Free. The Governance Didn't.

Microsoft gave the agent runtime away at Build 2026 and kept the layer that compounds: the identity an agent carries and the rules it runs under. MXC makes Windows a free, open host for anyone's runtime; Entra Agent ID and Agent 365 make Microsoft the office that issues every agent's passport. The money moved up a floor. All three hyperscalers are racing for that floor. Google is building the country: own everything, chip to inbox, and live inside it. AWS is building the bank: let someone else stamp the passport, own what an agent may do and spend. Microsoft is building the passport office. None of them has built the layer that crosses the border. An agent created in Google Cloud, governed in Microsoft 365, paying another company's agent on AWS has no single authority to authenticate it, audit it, revoke it everywhere, or settle what it owes. Each vendor builds that layer inside its own walls. For anyone building agent identity, provenance, or cross-cloud settlement, that absence is the opportunity.