System Scope and Context

Business Context

The Agentic Layer operates within a broader enterprise ecosystem as a control plane that coordinates AI agents and their interactions with external systems. It is designed to integrate into existing enterprise infrastructure rather than replace it, providing AI orchestration while keeping organizational control over data and operations.

System Boundary

The Agentic Layer Platform Boundary defines the scope of components under direct control of the orchestration system. This includes the Kubernetes-native components for agent management, AI gateway services, governance tools, and operational interfaces. External systems remain independent and integrate through standardized protocols.

System Context Overview

system-context

External Actors and Systems

External Frontends

Web, mobile, and other user-facing interfaces that connect to the Agentic Layer via the OpenAI Chat Completion API. They retain their own user experience and business logic and use the platform for AI interactions.

External Agents

AI agents running outside the platform that integrate with the Agentic Layer over the A2A (Agent-to-Agent) protocol. These can be existing AI systems, specialized agents, or third-party services that interact with platform-managed agents through a standardized protocol.

Apps

Applications that interact with the Agentic Layer via the AG-UI protocol. AG-UI provides a standardized interface for applications to communicate with agents and services managed by the Agentic Layer.

External Tool Servers

Tools and services exposed to agents through the MCP (Model Context Protocol). Examples include database access, file operations, and API integrations. The Agentic Layer’s Tool Gateway brokers these connections.

LLM Providers

External Large Language Model providers such as OpenAI, Google Gemini, and Anthropic Claude. The AI Gateway component routes requests to these providers. Locally deployed language models can be used as an alternative to cloud-based providers.

Observability Stack

External monitoring and logging infrastructure that receives telemetry from the Agentic Layer. Typical targets include enterprise monitoring solutions, log aggregation systems, and performance monitoring tools.

System Interactions

External System Connectivity

External systems interact with the Agentic Layer through protocol-specific entry points:

  • Via OpenAI Chat Completion API: External Frontends send requests using the OpenAI Chat Completion API

  • Via A2A: External Agents communicate over the Agent-to-Agent protocol

  • Via AG-UI: Apps connect over the AG-UI protocol

  • Via MCP: The Agentic Layer reaches External Tool Servers through the Model Context Protocol

AI Service Integration

The Agentic Layer mediates interactions with LLM providers through the AI Gateway, which:

  • Routes requests from agents to one or more LLM providers

  • Handles provider authentication and credential management

  • Supports both cloud-based and locally deployed language models

  • Collects usage telemetry for the requests it handles

Technical Context

The Agentic Layer acts as an integration hub rather than a data store. It orchestrates interactions between systems while maintaining a clear separation of concerns:

  • Stateless coordination: the platform focuses on coordination and routing rather than data storage

  • API-first integration: all interactions occur through defined APIs and standard protocols (A2A, MCP, AG-UI, OpenAI Chat Completion API)

  • Kubernetes-native deployment: components run as Kubernetes workloads and use Kubernetes primitives for scaling, service discovery, and operations