What's in the MCP stack?

The Model Context Protocol (MCP) is quickly becoming the "USB-C for AI applications," providing a standard way to connect AI models with external data sources and tools.

Since Anthropic introduced MCP in November 2024, it has grown from a technical specification into a thriving ecosystem with significant commercial opportunities. This growth is similar to the API tooling market that emerged around companies like Postman and Kong.

We're witnessing history repeat itself, but accelerated. Just as the API economy spawned billion-dollar infrastructure companies in the 2010s, MCP is creating similar opportunities today, only faster and with AI at the center. The parallels are striking: where Postman democratized API testing and Kong built the gateway layer, we're now seeing MCP-native companies emerge across hosting, infra, development tooling, authentication, and marketplace discovery.

The early indicators are compelling. Over 1,000 community-built MCP servers have emerged within six months of launch, while enterprise adoption is being driven by companies like OpenAI, Stripe, Intercom, Notion, Replit, and Sourcegraph.

The MCP ecosystem: 9 key categories

Rather than cataloging individual MCP servers (which every SaaS will eventually have, like APIs today), this market map focuses on the infrastructure and tooling companies that enable MCP adoption. These are the "picks and shovels" of the MCP ecosystem - the platforms, tools, and services that make it easy for any company to create, deploy, secure, and manage production-ready MCP servers.

1. MCP server generation & dev tools

From OpenAPI specs to runnable MCP servers

Development tools and SDKs form the backbone of the MCP development ecosystem, making it easier for developers to adopt, prototype, and deploy MCP-compatible servers and clients across languages and environments.

OpenAPI & doc-based generators

• Speakeasy: Convert OpenAPI → TypeScript with built-in runnability
• Stainless: Free OpenAPI → MCP generation with Cloudflare deployment
• Zuplo: Expose your API endpoints as MCP-compatible tools, resources, and prompts
• OpenAPI MCP Generator: CLI scaffolding tool for MCP-compatible projects
• Open-MCP: Turn web APIs into MCP servers in 10 seconds with open registry
• ScaleMCP: Turn APIs into AI agents
• Tadata: Connect your OpenAPI spec or use the SDK to launch a hosted MCP server

Agent-to-MCP generators

• LangChain MCP: Auto-generates MCP servers from LangChain tools and chains
• CrewAI MCP: Converts multi-agent workflows into MCP-compatible servers
• Workato: Turns integrations into standardized servers for AI-driven workflows

2. MCP hosting & infrastructure

Deploy and scale MCP servers without DevOps complexity

Platform and infrastructure providers offer foundational services that support MCP server deployment, hosting, and management, enabling enterprises and developers to effectively integrate MCP.

Managed MCP hosting

• Railway: Simple MCP server deployment with auto-scaling
• Fly.io: Edge deployment optimized for MCP workloads
• Render: Alternative to Railway, supports background workers (good for async MCP workflows)
• Higress: Provides an open-source, AI-native API gateway that supports MCP hosting
• Supermachine.ai: One-click remote hosted MCP servers

Cloud platform extensions

• Heroku MCP Toolkit: Auto-scaling, pay-per-use MCP server hosting
• Cloudflare Workers: Edge deployment with OAuth capabilities
• Google Cloud Run: Container-based hosting for MCP-compatibile APIs
• Vercel/Netlify: Serverless deploy for MCP apps
• Docker Hub (MCP Catalog): Containerized MCP image registry

3. Auth & identity for MCP

OAuth for MCP

• Scalekit: Modular auth platform for AI applications. Drop-in OAuth 2.1 specifically designed for MCP servers
• Descope: Add compliant, OAuth-based authorization to MCP servers and deploy them
• Stytch: Connected apps built for AI agents, MCP servers
• Auth0: Identity platform with auth for GenAI

4. MCP-as-a-service platforms

Prebuilt, authenticated connections to popular SaaS tools. These are “Zapier for MCP" players.

Simplify AI integration through prebuilt, authenticated connectors to popular SaaS tools, significantly accelerating deployment and reducing complexity.

Multi-app Connectors

• Zapier MCP: 7,000+ apps and 30,000+ actions through a unified MCP layer
• Composio: Managed, authenticated MCP servers across 100+ apps
• Arcade.dev: AI tool-calling with pre-authenticated MCP integrations
• Nango: Unified API abstraction layer with LLM use cases
• Firecrawl: Offers web scraping via MCP
• Copilot SDK: Pre-built MCP connectors for popular SaaS tools

5. MCP testing & dev experience

Accelerate development with specialized debugging and testing tools. Streamline iterative processes for developers through IDE integrations and inspectors.

Testing & debugging

• MCP Inspector: Visual UI for request/response inspection
• Online MCP Inspector: Browser-based testing interface
• Postman MCP: Collection-based MCP server testing
• Bruno: API testing tool with MCP server support

IDE integrations

• VS Code (MCP Plugin) – Native management + chat ops
• Cursor MCP: Native ^{.cursor/mcp.json} integration

• Visual Studio MCP: Windows support for MCP workflows

6. MCP registries & marketplaces

Marketplaces and discovery platforms help users easily find, evaluate, and adopt MCP tools and servers, enhancing visibility and community engagement.

MCP Marketplaces

• Cline Marketplace: One-click install via VS Code
• Glama: Directory with 1,600+ MCP servers
• mcp.so: Community-indexed hub with 3,000+ MCP projects
• Smithery: Registry with CLI install commands
• MCPMarket.com: Directory of MCP servers and clients to connect AI agents with your favorite tools.

Registries & discovery APIs

• OpenTools Registry: API-first discovery with LLM and billing built-in
• Awesome MCP Servers: Curated Github repo collection of MCP servers
• Cursor Directory: Curated list for Cursor IDE workflows
• PulseMCP: GitHub-linked community index

7. Connection & proxy management

Handle multi-MCP deployments by managing routing, composition, and endpoint management. They simplify complex integrations through intuitive GUI and middleware solutions, providing intuitive control over large-scale deployments.

MCP proxies, gateways, & middleware

• MetaMCP: GUI-based multiplexer and connection manager
• PluggedIn MCP Proxy: Debugging proxy with bundled endpoint support
• McGravity: Compose multiple MCPs into single callable endpoints

8. MCP clients

“Interfaces that allow users and developers to interact with MCP servers from their desktop, IDE, or command-line”

• Claude Desktop: Desktop app that lets users query and test MCP servers directly from Claude’s native interface.
• Cursor MCP client: Integrated into the Cursor IDE, providing in-editor access to MCP endpoints for development and debugging.
• Zed MCP client: Embedded in the Zed code editor, offering quick MCP endpoint access during coding sessions.
• Windsurf MCP Client (Cascade): Lightweight client designed for orchestrating and chaining MCP calls across multiple endpoints.

9. MCP security

preventing security issues during AI-assisted coding if devs are calling particular tools/docs via their MCP servers.

• Snyk: scans AI-generated code and AI-suggested open source packages for security issues.

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Market analogies and growth potential

The MCP infrastructure market is expanding in critical areas essential to widespread adoption and effectiveness:

• Developer experience: Companies in this space deliver tools that significantly reduce the complexity developers face when moving from concept to production. The emphasis is on intuitive design, rapid prototyping, and eliminating cumbersome setup tasks.
• OAuth 2.1 compliance: Security is foundational. Successful providers integrate robust security measures, specifically OAuth 2.1 compliance, directly into their solutions, ensuring safety and reliability from day one.
• Ecosystem integration: Effective MCP infrastructure fits naturally into existing developer workflows. Companies thriving here provide integrations and compatibility with commonly used developer environments, ensuring minimal disruption and friction.
• Scalability: Successful MCP solutions reliably handle extensive workloads and scale easily from startups to enterprise-grade deployments without complex re-engineering or significant downtime.
• Standards compliance: As MCP specifications evolve, companies that remain agile, quickly adopting and supporting new standards, are best positioned for longevity and leadership.

Emerging market opportunities providing significant growth potential include:

• No-code MCP creation: Platforms that allow users without technical expertise to build functional MCP servers visually or intuitively, democratizing access and adoption.
• AI-optimized server generation: Advanced tools specifically designed to create MCP servers optimized for AI-agent interactions, going beyond basic API-to-MCP conversions to deliver more sophisticated integrations.
• Cross-platform deployment: Solutions that offer universal compatibility across multiple cloud providers, enabling flexibility and reducing vendor lock-in risks.
• Analytics platforms: Specialized tools that offer detailed visibility into AI-agent interactions through targeted analytics, empowering teams to understand, optimize, and refine deployments based on performance data.
• Compliance automation: Automated tools that simplify ensuring MCP servers comply with evolving regulatory requirements, reducing the complexity and cost of manual compliance processes.

Final word

MCP is shaping up to be a foundational layer for the next generation of AI-native applications. As the ecosystem grows, we're seeing new standards, tools, and business models emerge that echo the early days of the API economy.

The MCP space represents a classic "picks and shovels" opportunity. As MCP solidifies as the AI integration standard, the market will expand broadly in the following categories:

• Horizontal platforms addressing core infrastructure challenges (authentication, hosting, testing)
• Developer-first tooling accelerating time-to-market
• Enterprise-focused solutions emphasizing security, governance, and compliance
• Integration specialists linking MCP to established enterprise systems

Whether you're building AI infrastructure, experimenting with agentic systems, or just looking to plug in safely and scalably, the MCP landscape offers a ton of opportunity.

If you're working on something new and exciting in this space, or want to explore a technology partnership, we'd love to hear from you. Reach out to us at founders@scalekit.com.