European Accessibility Act, the timetable speaks for itself: as of June 28, 2025, IT products and services will have to comply with various accessibility requirements.

In addition to a regulatory requirement, the European directive is also a business opportunity. In this article we take stock of the situation.

European Accessibility Act (EAA): what is the EU accessibility directive

The EAA-an acronym that stands for European Accessibility Act-is the European Directive 2019/882 that introduces, at the EU level, rules related to digital accessibility for most private companies.

Accessibility is the degree to which products, systems (…) can be used by a population with a wide range of needs, characteristics and capabilities to achieve specific goals in a specific context of use. (ISO 9241-11)

Unlike EU Directive 2016/2102, which regulated the accessibility of public bodies’ websites and apps, the EAA addresses digital products and services offered by the private world.

The Accessibility Act, in fact, covers hardware and software such as self-service terminals for payments, home banking, e-books and electronic commerce(e-commerce) services.

…but wasn’t there already an accessibility law?

Yes, at least in Italy. Now let’s have some order.

The first to land in the national legal system was Law 4/2004 (known as the Stanca Law), which made accessibility of digital services an obligation for various entities.

In addition to companies, bodies and entities of the public administration, in 2020 the text was supplemented with a Decree Law that also included private companies with an average three-year turnover of more than 500 million euros.

The law-whose non-compliance results in a fine of up to 5 percent of turnover-was consolidated in the legal framework with the implementation of Legislative Decree 106/2018, which transposed the aforementioned EU Directive 2016/2102, standardizing accessibility obligations for PAs at the EU level.

The European directive on the Accessibility Act and the Legislative Decree 82/2022 that implemented it from July 2022, close the circle of legal entities obligated to digital accessibility.

By June 2025 all private companies will have to comply with specific accessibility requirements; obligations that will cover not only services, but for the first time also digital products.

Why digital accessibility legislation? Between inclusiveness and opportunity

First and foremost, the rationale for the legislation can be traced back to unquestionable requirements of social progress: ensuring that every individual has adequate enjoyment of products and services improves the lives of everyone.

According toWHO, in fact, more than one in four (135 million) people with disabilities in Europe and, of these, 65 percent say they are held back from purchasing by barriers of various kinds(Forbes).

In addition to a necessary issue of inclusiveness, it is therefore evident how the Accessibility Act, especially for e-commerce, also brings with it undoubted market opportunities.

EAA 2025: EU accessibility directive explained easy

Understanding that companies selling products and services via e-commerce will also have to comply with the dictates of the Accessibility Act, let us now focus on what those rules are.

In a nutshell, organizations will be required to meet compliance levels A and AA of WACG 2.1, guidelines developed by the WWW consortium containing a set of recommendations, with varying levels of intensity, in order to ensure accessible Web experiences.

There are four key principles on which the accessibility rules are based.

Perceivability dictates content that can be perceived by people with sensory disabilities;operability protects the effectiveness of web interactions without the use of a mouse.

Simple language and clear layout are the result of the third principle, that of understandability; finally, robustness implies that digital products and services are compatible with assistive tools used by users with disabilities.

Accessibility Act 2025: what impacts for e-commerce?

The very long list of provisions by content type can be found on the website containing the WCAG 2.1. Di seguito abbiamo individuato alcuni interventi da considerare suddivisi per tipologia di contenuto tipicamente presente nelle pagine degli e-commerce.

Product Information and Accessibility Act

Accessible text descriptions, including alternatives to multimedia content (such as image alt-texts) should be concise. If more detail is needed, a link to another section, either within or outside the web page, should be provided to the user.

On the subject of textual content, it should also be noted that it will be mandatory to keep a record of the optimization work carried out to the various assets, which will be consulted during any audits by the relevant authorities.

Audio Files and Accessibility Act

Each audio file must be accompanied by text alternatives and subtitles, with the exception of audio alternatives to text content. Users must also be able to have full control over the volume and playback of the content.

Images and Accessibility Act

For images, the most relevant provisions indicate the need for atextual alternative and that enjoyment does not depend onscreen orientation.

Video and Accessibility Act

Aspects to pay more attention to with video content include: text alternative, subtitles and anaudio description of the clip, as well as volume and playback control as with audio files.

What are the benefits of the European Accessibility Act?

Complying with accessibility rules is not only necessary to shield oneself from financial penalties nor is it to be considered a mere trappings of inclusiveness.

At stake is the improvement of the living conditions of a sizeable segment of the population, as well as significant benefits for businesses.

First and foremost, because of a mathematical issue: the more accessible the e-commerce, the broader the user base and thus the greater the volume of conversions.

Google, moreover, rewards web pages with images with alt-text as well as dry and well-organized text (H1, H2…); on the other hand, pages that are not very accessible raise the bounce rate, penalizing organic positioning (SEO).

Accessibility efforts will also enhance the user experience and generally reinforce apositive brand image.

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European Accessibility Act, the timetable speaks for itself: as of June 28, 2025, IT products and services will have to comply with various accessibility requirements.

In addition to a regulatory requirement, the European directive is also a business opportunity. In this article we take stock of the situation.

European Accessibility Act (EAA): what is the EU accessibility directive

The EAA – an acronym that stands for European Accessibility Act – is the European Directive 2019/882 that introduces, at the EU level, rules related to digital accessibility for most private companies.

A widely-accepted definition of  Accessibility refers to the “extent to which products, systems, (…) can be used by people from a population with the widest range of characteristics and capabilities to achieve a specified goal in a specified context of use.” (ISO 9241)

Unlike EU Directive 2016/2102, which regulated the accessibility of public administration websites and apps, the EAA addresses digital products and services offered by the private world.

The Accessibility Act, in fact, covers hardware and software such as self-service terminals for payments, home banking, e-books and electronic commerce (e-commerce) services.

…but wasn’t there already an accessibility law?

Yes, at least in Italy. Now let’s have some order.

The first to land in the national legal system was Law 4/2004 (known as the Stanca Law), which made accessibility of digital services an obligation for various entities.

In addition to public bodies, in 2020 the text was supplemented with a Decree Law that also included private companies with an average three-year turnover of more than 500 million euros.

The law-whose non-compliance results in a fine of up to 5 percent of turnover-was consolidated in the legal framework with the implementation of Legislative Decree 106/2018, which transposed the aforementioned EU Directive 2016/2102, standardizing accessibility obligations for PAs at the EU level.

The European directive on the Accessibility Act and the Legislative Decree 82/2022 that implemented it from July 2022, close the circle of legal entities obligated to digital accessibility.

By June 2025 all companies will have to comply with specific accessibility requirements; obligations that will cover not only services, but for the first time also digital products.

Why digital accessibility legislation? Between inclusiveness and opportunity

First and foremost, the reason why of the legislation can be traced back to unquestionable requirements of social progress: ensuring that each person has adequate enjoyment of products and services improves the lives of everyone.

According to WHO, in fact, more than one in four (135 million) people with disabilities in Europe and, of these, 65 percent say they are held back from purchasing by barriers of various kinds (Forbes).

In addition to a necessary issue of inclusiveness, it is therefore evident how the Accessibility Act, especially for e-commerce, also brings with it undoubted market opportunities.

EAA 2025: EU accessibility directive explained easy

Understanding that companies selling products and services via e-commerce will also have to comply with the dictates of the Accessibility Act, let us now focus on what those rules are.

In a nutshell, organizations will be required to meet compliance levels A and AA of WACG 2.1, guidelines developed by the WWW consortium containing a set of recommendations, with varying levels of intensity, in order to ensure accessible Web experiences.

There are four key principles on which the accessibility rules are based.

Perceivability dictates content that can be perceived by people with sensory disabilities; operability protects the effectiveness of web interactions without the use of a mouse.

Simple language and clear layout are the result of the third principle, that of understandability; finally, robustness implies that digital products and services are compatible with assistive tools used by users with disabilities.

Accessibility Act 2025: what impacts for e-commerce?

The very long list of provisions by content type can be found on the website containing the WCAG 2.1. In the following, we have identified a few of interventions to consider, broken down by type of content typically found on e-commerce pages.

Product Information and Accessibility Act

Accessible text descriptions, including alternatives to multimedia content (such as image alt-texts) should be concise. If more detail is needed, a link to another section, either within or outside the web page, should be provided to the user.

On the subject of textual content, it should also be noted that it will be mandatory to keep a record of the optimization work carried out to the various assets, which will be consulted during any audits by the relevant authorities.

Audio Files and Accessibility Act

Each audio file must be accompanied by alternative text and subtitles, with the exception of audio alternatives to text content. Users must also be able to have full control over the volume and playback of the content.

Images and Accessibility Act

For images, the most relevant provisions indicate the need for an alternative text and that media fruition does not depend on screen orientation.

Video and Accessibility Act

Aspects to pay more attention to with video content include: alt-text, subtitles and an audio description of the clip, as well as volume and playback control as with audio files.

What are the benefits of the European Accessibility Act?

Complying with accessibility rules is not only necessary to shield oneself from financial penalties nor is it to be considered a mere trappings of inclusiveness.

At stake is the improvement of the living conditions of a sizeable segment of the population, as well as significant benefits for businesses.

First and foremost, because of a mathematical issue: the more accessible the e-commerce, the broader the user base and thus the greater the volume of conversions.

Google, moreover, rewards web pages with images with alt-text as well as dry and well-organized text (H1, H2…); on the other hand, pages that are not very accessible raise the bounce rate, penalizing organic positioning (SEO).

Accessibility efforts will also enhance the user experience and generally reinforce a positive brand image.

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PIM vs PXM, DAM vs PIM and then again PXM vs DAM: what are the differences between these software?

Are there also similarities between them? The answer in the next few lines, in which you can learn more about the purpose, functionality, benefits and reference team for each application. Go!

PIM vs PXM vs DAM: what are we talking about?

Let’s start with the basics.

The acronym PIM refers to Product Information Management software, a solution for governing product information. A Digital Asset Management (DAM) tool, on the other hand, focuses on organizing digital assets.

Finally, a software PXM is a tool for managing the product experience (hence the extended name “Product eXperience Management”).

Similarities and functional differences between the systems

To focus on the real differences between DAM, PIM, and PXM, it is necessary to be clear that all three types of platforms help companies centralize, organize, and distribute their market-focused content assets, whether B2B or B2C.

But so what changes? First and foremost, the focus.

PIM and DAM offer predominantly vertical management, aimed respectively at data and information in the former case, and multimedia content such as photos, videos and documents in the latter.

A PXM, on the other hand, aims to govern the experience of customers interacting with the assortment in the various communication and sales channels in which the company is present.

To achieve this goal, a Product eXperience Management software incorporates the capabilities of PIM and DAM software and combines them with others that cut across the customer experience.

One of them, perhaps the most crucial, is Syndication, a feature by which PXM software propagates a piece of data or content across multiple channels, often automatically optimizing attributes such as format, size and background color.

In a nutshell, rather than PIM vs PXM vs DAM, it is more correct to speak of PXM = PIM + DAM.

PIM vs PXM vs DAM: purpose of the tools.

A PIM is information governance-oriented software for every item proposed to the market by the organization. Therefore, among the main functionalities of such a solution is the centralization of data.

In fact, the system, by dialoguing with systems such as ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) and PLM (Product Lifecycle Management) serves as a single source of information truth. In addition, a PIM consolidates data, relating and making all information about a product easily searchable.

Similarly, a DAM software performs centralization and consolidation functions for any digital asset, such as images, video, audio, documents (such as presentations and brand guidelines).

Although DAM and PIM can also deal with distribution-assets and data, respectively-it is the PXM software that shifts the viewpoint outward from the organization.

In fact, while the main purpose of tools to manage product information and digital assets is convergence, a PXM is customer experience oriented.

Since the latter is closely linked to digital information and assets, a Product eXperience Management software makes sure-as well as the convergence-all content is optimized and propagated, providing an omnichannel, B2B and B2C customer experience.

Typical users by platform

PIM vs. PXM vs. DAM: The differences become more pronounced when talking about typical users or, more generally, the main teams that benefit from each of the platforms.

A Product Information Management system, for example, primarily uses people from offices that gravitate along the entire supply chain of an item: design, research and development, logistics, and, most importantly, e-commerce.

The user personas of a DAM, on the other hand, typically pertain to marketing and branding functions that leverage it to share media and templates with the rest of the company.

The cross-functional nature of a PXM, as seen at the beginning of the article, makes it a useful tool for all teams, both those benefiting from a PIM and a DAM; they are also joined by the sales area, given the support for the entire product catalog creation and distribution flow,

There’s more: in cases of highly integrable PXM, the tools are also ideal for professionals in the Digital and IT areas, with which they cut IT budgets and manual tasks, simplifying the IT stack.

DAM vs. PIM vs. PXM: benefits compared

DAM and PIM offer mirror benefits.

Digital asset management software centralizes and organizes media content, encouraging searchability and reuse. Should it also handle distribution, it can shorten the company’s media time to market. Benefits similar to those of a PIM with respect to product data.

In general, if such solutions have workflow capabilities, they can accelerate team collaboration and digitize previously analog or unstructured processes.

Even at this juncture, a PXM combines the benefits of DAM and PIM, going even further to deliver prestige shopping experiences and fostering product discoverability through high-performance, personalized content updated in real time on every channel. Word from our customers!

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Hey there! In this article you will find an overview of the world of Product Information Management.

You’ll find out what the acronym PIM stands for, understand the meaning of the term Product Information Management, and learn about the benefits of a team adopting PIM software. Let’s get going!

Product Information Management: what is PIM?

Let’s start with the acronym: PIM stands for Product Information Management.

In IT circles, the acronym is rather well known because it denotes a widespread type of software that, as you might guess, enables the management of product information.

In addition to being an IT solution, Product Information Management is also a process, establishing the optimal flow by which companies should govern their product data.

What is meant by Product Information?

Product Information means any data useful for identifying, describing, promoting and selling an item in the company’s assortment.

This information consists of a set of attributes (common to a product category or the entire assortment) and their value (data), which varies from item to item.

In the simple example in the table above, all attributes are in common with the “Shoe” and “Jeans” categories except Fitting, which pertains only to pants.

Of course, product code, size and color are just a few examples of attributes, the number of which can range from a few dozen to several hundred, depending on aspects such as product type, geographic markets and sales channels.

The key role of product data

A product’s information is crucial to shopping, especially online.

In general, there are statistics galore attesting to the importance of product data in the e-commerce world. For example, according to research, 94% of consumers abandon a purchase because of irrelevant search results.

Product sheets with up-to-date information are crucial for an omnichannel shopping experience, because they avoid destabilizing the user when switching from one channel to another.

In addition, curated and engaging descriptions provide many other benefits: from optimal search engine placement (SEO) to consolidating brand perception in the marketplace and reducing returns and negative reviews.

Merchandise that does not conform to descriptions (and photos) is among the top causes of negative reviews in various industries, such as toys (23 percent), jewelry (17 percent), fashion and beauty (12 percent), and food (4 percent).

What does it mean to manage product information?

Having grasped the importance of product data, we must now ask what it means to manage it.

In general, all those activities aimed at ensuring that product data are integral, consistent, searchable, up-to-date and accessible on the journey from business management to sales channels, B2B or B2C, online but also offline, fall under the PIM umbrella.

A long and varied journey, which is why product data management (from English Product Information Management) is an activity to which disparate teams in the company contribute.

Who manages product information in the company?

In structured companies that also sell online, E-Commerce and Digital Managers are among the key figures in PIM Product Information Management.

Their figure, among other things, is called upon to organize product content and monitor its distribution to end channels. Product information management, however, is influenced by and impacts the operations of many other teams.

Copywriters and translators, for example, enrich product data derived from management systems such as ERP, with catchy, multilingual descriptions.

If the PIM approach is quality, it also improves the consistency and effectiveness of Marketing‘s content strategy activities, just as Sales can rely on consistent information at all times.

What a PIM software is for

The number of stakeholders and the extreme importance of product information to the market amplify the volume of activities required, elevating the teams’ dose of manual labor.

It is at this juncture that technology provides valuable support.

Sometimes labeled Product Information Manager, a PIM software addresses two of the main needs of any company: reducing manual labor and increasing sales.

How does PIM software work?

First and foremost, a Product Information Management software acts as a link between management systems and end channels such as websites, portals, e-commerce and marketplaces.

In addition to providing continuity to the information flow, a PIM centralizes data favoring searchability, transforms it on the basis of automated rules, and enables its storytelling to be enriched with descriptions, images and videos.

What benefits does PIM software provide

The introduction of a Product Information Management solution centralizes every piece of data, preventing its dispersion, loss and misalignment. In addition, a PIM cuts down on manual labor and reduces errors resulting from copy-paste typical of non-digitized environments.

No more scattered Excel spreadsheets, then, in addition to instant publication on web channels, which shortens Time to Market, the time it takes to reach users to products, campaigns or collections.

You can go even further than a PIM — with a PXM.

The product catalog is a tool that is as essential to selling as it is onerous to produce and update, especially for businesses that sell online.

A PXM software is an indispensable ally in zeroing in on operations and amplifying the benefits that come from the flow of creating, publishing and updating the product catalog.

In this article you will find out how.

Product catalog: what it is by now we all know just that

You certainly don’t have to be a salesperson, marketer or e-commerce manager to know that a product catalog is a neat collection of photos and information about a company’s assortment.

A catalog may include all or part of products, have a limited duration (as in the case of fashion and its seasons), target exclusive markets, or be intended for multiple channels.

It is this latter aspect that we will focus on most in this article.

Catalog management in the omnichannel era

We don’t want to repeat the spiel you’ve probably read everywhere by now, but it’s the truth: digital has revolutionized purchasing processes and, by extension, catalog management.

As a result, when it comes to product catalogs, the spotlights are almost always on the content of site, e-commerce and marketplace pages, which require massive levels of instantaneity and consistency that, without proper support, result in a lot of manual labor.

Automated catalog: present and future go through here

Not surprisingly, the market for Product eXperience Management, solutions that help companies deliver an omnichannel product experience to customers, is estimated to be growing at a compound average annual rate of 18.2 percent and an estimated value of 6.3 billion in 2028.

Among the main benefits of a PXM platform is the reduction of operational work, guaranteed by the automatic publication of the catalog and related product sheets. But there is much more.

In the following paragraphs we will explore 7 problems that can be solved with an automated catalog.

#1 Stop copy-pasting Master Data

Master Data (or Master Data) is so-called product master information and typically resides in enterprise management systems such as ERP software.

Some Master Data flow directly into the product sheets: this is the case, for example, with the product code (such as EAN). Others, however, must be adapted depending on the publication channel.

This is the case with size: if the company sells online in different geographic markets, the size of the same item will vary depending on the country for which the product sheet is intended. In the absence of digitization, manual labor and the risks of error, with wide and deep assortments, rise.

Solutions such as a PXM with which to automate product uploads facilitate Master Data management because they automatically populate e-commerce and marketplaces with data streams from ERP, delivering them directly or transforming them.

Transformations are made possible by rules, by which the most advanced PXM tools allow the same data item to automatically take on different values based on the catalog for which it is intended.

#2 The creation of Editorial Data accelerates

The flow of creating a product catalog is not limited to flowing downstream Master Data from the ERP but also includes planning, writing and distributing Editorial Data.

While Master Data is informative in scope, Editorial Data is more commercial in nature, as it promotes product storytelling.

Copywriters and translators-even from ERP data-enrich existing information and generate new information, such as marketing descriptions. Creative flows that, with manual management, occur in a fragmented way and with inefficient replication for each channel and catalog.

With PXM software, the development of Editorial Data accelerates because it gives the various teams a single workspace in which they can plan their various activities and say goodbye to Excel spreadsheets.

In addition, thanks to the rules already mentioned, it is possible to pre-populate some fields with data combos found on tools such as ERP or PLM to make the work of language and word experts more agile.

3. No more hours thrown into categorizing products on each channel

Categories are valuable guides to the customer experience.

However, they risk increasing time to market, especially in companies that are not very digitally structured and have many products to promote in different sales channels.

The same item, in fact, might be categorized differently on different catalogs, depending on the structure of the various marketplaces or on brand choices; in fact, among our clients‘ e-commerce, there are realities that differentiate categories depending on thegeographical area of reference.

A PXM solution, thanks to configurable rule engines, zeroes out the time spent (or lost) categorizing products.

Having established the trees of the various catalogs, for example, the most powerful tools automatically assign items to the various catalogs (and their categories) based on the value of one or more product data.

4. Cross-selling and up-selling take off

An automated catalog does more than just reduce promotional costs and time.

By digitizing the creative flow as you can with PXM software, in fact, you can leverage rule engines and automatically associate multiple products with each other, creating bundles of items or purchase suggestions featured on site and marketplace pages to elevate the average shopping cart.

5. No more delayed campaigns

The introduction of a Product eXperience Management solution also impacts collaboration between even very different teams. Customers who have chosen SeeCommerce, for example, leverage its Attribute Planning to schedule workflows.

To give an example, for each catalog it is possible to set the dates for photo shoots (aligned with the logistical flows involving the physical arrival of the products) and, cascadingly, those for post-production activities, copy enrichment and, finally, catalog publication.

The main benefit of scheduling activities is to avert misalignments between departments and delays along the process, the main cause of slowed market launches, with what that does to the business.

6. Populating views becomes a breeze

So far we have talked largely about data but the other half of the apple, indeed, of a product sheet is undoubtedly photos, videos, documents–in a word: media (or digital assets).

Front, back, still-life: the views of a single product are numerous, and often a shot will vary in size, format, or background color depending on the target catalog.

A PXM solution also optimizes this flow, which, done manually, requires intensive editing activities, by automatically optimizing the specifications of a media.

Another major time benefit is provided by automated product-content association. SeeCommerce, to do this, leverages the naming convention; the system is instructed to recognize file nomenclatures and instantly associate them with a specific product.

This makes it possible to retrieve, at the search stage, not only all the information in an article, but also the digital assets that represent it. Without the need for any manual activity.

7. The demise of misaligned catalogs

Last but not least: updating. How many times does it take to touch up that data, remove that one too many line spacing, update that inaccurate shot? Let’s answer together: too many!

A PXM software also takes care of this aspect, which, moreover, is essential to be able to speak for real about automatic publication of product sheets.

With SeeCommerce PXM, you don’t need to access the back-end systems of e-commerce or portals to update a piece of information or content, because the tool integrates with your end channels and distributes the most up-to-date version of data and media to the front ends of your digital storefronts in real time.

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Between now and 2030, the EU ESPR Regulation will come into force, which, among other measures, includes the Digital Product Passport (or DPP).

What is the Digital Product Passport? What sectors does it cover? What impacts will it bring with it? In this article we take stock of the situation.

Digital Product Passport: what is the DPP

Let’s get straight to the point.

The acronym DPP stands for Digital Product Passport is a digital register containing a variety of information related to the value chain of an item.

Soon, European companies will have to accompany each product with a detailed list of data on its lifecycle, from production to recycling, through repairability and disposal.

Digital Product Passport: how does it work?

The fruition of DPPs will be clearer from the moment they see their full implementation, but it is likely that standards already in the market such as QR codes will be exploited to access a product’s digital passport.

Once scanned, the code will return to the consumer a set of detailed data on materials, composition, production cycle, varying from sector to sector.

What are Digital Product Passports for?

To understand the purpose of the digital passport produced, it should be mentioned that it is part of the ESPR regulation, approved in spring 2024.

ESPR stands for Ecodesign for Sustainable Product Regulation, a regulation that is part of the Green Deal, a package of EU initiatives to reduce emissions by at least 55 percent by 2030.

ESPR’s focus is to extend eco-design to most products on the EU market in order to reduce the environmental impact of their lifecycle, as is already the case with household appliances.

In addition, ESPR introduces new requirements and standards regarding durability, reparability, energy efficiency and recycling of items in order to counter planned obsolescence and promote circularity.

In this context, the DPP will serve as an informational reference point:

• for companies, which will have a lever of objective and concrete transparency
• for consumers to make more informed and green choices
• for the authorities-who by receiving the data to display in their portals-will be facilitated in controls and increase consumer confidence.

… okay but what about the competition?

Indeed, in the free market, companies’ duties of transparency may collide with the protection of competition.

The broad informational scope of the DPP, could compromise the confidentiality of strategic data, such as those related to production and procurement flows.

For this reason, the Legislature clarified that of all the information included in the DPP, only some will be accessible to consumers, while others will be accessible only by parties witha “legitimate interest,” as determined by the Regulation itself or by the Commission.

When will the Digital Product Passport be mandatory?

At least two steps are planned before the DPPs come into effect:

• the European Commission will present a three-year work plan in 2025, establishing the types of products affected by the regulation
• defined the types of products, a delegated act will be made for each of them, which will enshrine what data each sector must adhere to.

There are currently no firm dates, but it is reasonable to assume that digital product passports will come into effect before 2030 (for some sectors as early as 2027).

For which areas will the DPP requirement be triggered in the first place?

From an initial analysis by the European Commission, the product categories first affected by the new Digital Product Passport will be batteries, textiles, electronics and construction.

Battery companies, for example, as of February 1, 2027 will have to prepare a DPP that includes information on the durability, performance and CO2 impact of each product.

In turn, it is likely that the Digital Product Passport – precisely because of its goals of ubiquity – will be extended to any other commodity sector, with a few exclusions (which will apparently cover food items, animal feed, and pharmaceuticals).

What technology will the Digital Product Passport be based on?

Rumors agree that the technology that will enable the emergence of DPP will be blockchain, which is known to offer a digital infrastructure that provides security, transparency and immutability of every record entered by the various actors in an information chain.

By the way, digital passport in luxury fashion already exists

Fashion, particularly that which occupies the highest end of the market, has always been a forerunner of major digital developments.

Not surprisingly, it has also moved ahead at this juncture, through a consortium and voluntary membership project called Aura Blockchain.

The platform, developed by such giants as LVMH, OTB, Cartier and the Prada Group, offers traceability that shields consumers from counterfeits.

Tod’s, for example, has embedded an NFC (Non-Fungible Token) tag in its Di Bag that leverages the Aura project’s blockchain to return data to the customer-who scans it with his or her smartphone-that attests to the authenticity and provenance of the bag’s materials.

Image Source: Temera.com

DPP: will companies need ad hoc software?

The management of DPP is closely related to that of product information and, in particular, its centralization, enrichment and delivery.

In view of the new obligation, it is clear that companies that are unstructured from a Product Information Management point of view will be able to seize the opportunity to equip themselves with PIM software-or better yet, PXM software.

Conversely, companies that have already embarked on such digital paths will need to ensure that the tools in use support the management and propagation of DPP data.

Our platform, for example, is SaaS, offers a hyper-flexible data model, and, thanks to APIs, delivers product content (data and media) across any channel. Key features to comply with future DPP obligations.

From regulatory obligation to business opportunity

DPPs are much more than a regulatory requirement.

Digital Product Passports, in fact, can be a useful tool for sharing information and documents that enrich the product experience through certified attestations of a brand’s quality authenticity.

It is also a democratic tool for promoting sustainability actions because the data travels on a third-party-guaranteed circuit, making it easier to detect greenwashing phenomena.

Last but not least, it can facilitate the sale of additional services or products such as repair, disposal, maintenance and repair items.

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