The foundational technical standards for the digital product passport (DPP) are in place. At the international conference DPP4EU 2026 (June 1–3, Brussels), experts are presenting the newly published European standards to a broad industry audience and discussing concrete steps toward implementation.
The DPP is designed to provide consumers, businesses, and authorities with reliable product information across the entire life cycle – from manufacturing through use to recycling. The EU Battery Regulation introduced the first mandatory passport in 2023; additional product categories including textiles, electronics, furniture, and building materials are set to follow.
Fraunhofer Institute for Production Systems and Design Technology (Fraunhofer IPK) played a central role in developing the interoperable technical framework. Prof. Thomas Knothe, who chairs CEN/CENELEC Joint Technical Committee 24 (JTC 24), and his team developed an open-source testing system that allows organizations to validate their DPP implementations. According to Fraunhofer IPK, companies using sector-specific reference systems can set up DPP-compliant infrastructure roughly five times faster compared to conventional approaches.
To ensure global compatibility, Knothe is also involved in aligning European DPP standards with international frameworks under ISO and IEC. Fraunhofer IPK regards the DPP not as an endpoint, but as the foundation for global product data ecosystems – with the longer-term goal of using it as a hub for cross-sector data exchange.
