Spring Boot startup fails: ClassNotFoundException: org.springframework.core.retry.RetryTemplate in brave-chatbot MCP client

[weeiner]

I am trying to run the brave-chatbot example from the Spring AI MCP client (spring-ai-examples/model-context-protocol/web-search/brave-chatbot). The application fails to start due to a missing class:

java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: org.springframework.core.retry.RetryTemplate

Steps taken:

Added spring-retry dependency to pom.xml (tried both 2.0.5 and 2.0.11).
Verified the dependency is present in the Maven tree.
Tried changing Spring Boot versions (3.4.5, 3.3.6).
Updated application.properties and mcp-servers-config.json for API keys.
Excluded problematic autoconfigurations and enabled bean overriding.
Rebuilt and ran the application multiple times.
Environment:

macOS
Java 17+
Spring Boot 3.x
Spring AI 2.0.0-SNAPSHOT
Maven
Expected:
Application should start successfully.

Actual:
Startup fails with ClassNotFoundException: org.springframework.core.retry.RetryTemplate.

Additional info:

Environment variables and config files are correct.
Not a git repository (local copy).
No direct changes to Java source files.
Request:
Please advise on resolving this dependency issue or provide a working configuration for the MCP client example.