From “Industrial ID Card” to “Digital Product Passport”: Globalization-oriented Identifiers Application Practice

On April 19, 2024, the “Trust and Intelligence” forum, the main forum of the 2024 TA Conference was successfully held in Xiamen. In the context of scientific and technological revolution and industrial change, the forum initiated a communication platform for building a multi-dimensional and fully connected digital industrial ecology, with comprehensively and systematically promoting China’s industrial Internet identifiers system as its starting point. At the main forum, the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT) ceremoniously launched the Xinghuo Strategy, namely, the development strategy of industrial Internet identifiers, serving as the key pillar for the national strategy of building China into a country characterized by strong manufacturing, network, and digital power. In response to the grand vision of building a community of shared future in cyberspace proposed by President Xi, the Xinghuo Strategy aims at building China-led digital space connectivity standards, core facilities, and service systems at the infrastructure level represented by identifiers, and promoting the construction of a cyber economic space of reciprocal interconnection and equal common governance while forming development advantages for China’s industries through digitization.

Liu Yang, Deputy Chief Engineer of the Institute for Industrial Internet and Internet of Things (IIIIoT) of CAICT, highlighted the important scenario of the Digital Product Passport (DPP), which constitutes a critical proportion of Xinghuo’s strategic innovation business.

Liu Yang, Deputy Chief Engineer of the IIIIoT of CAICT, presented “Digital Product Passport (DPP): A Globalization-Oriented Identifier Application Practice” at the 2024 TA Conference.

Just as tourists need passports to travel between different countries and regions, the Digital Product Passport (DPP) can describe the supply chain, manufacturing process, logistics and transportation, environmental impact, and other information about products. The academic and industrial circles have basically had most of the reserve work to carry out the DPP, said Liu Yang. This concept has been highly valued by major countries around the world once it is proposed, mainly from the following three considerations. Firstly, from the perspective of product intelligence upgrading, the development of “intelligent networked products” needs richer descriptions and more convenient access; Secondly, from the perspective of global trade, against the background of “integrating digital technologies into the real economy sector”, cross-border trade urgently needs a globally interconnected product data network; Thirdly, from the perspective of strengthening governance, new technological hotspots such as data cross-border and green low-carbon require strong technical support for regulation and governance. In view of the above considerations, the DPP is gradually developing into a key system device and capability integration for the global product data flow network.

On the realization path of how to create the DPP, Liu Yang pointed out four key steps. The first is to clarify the process design, by focusing on the needs of product life cycle management and building three main links for generating, management, and application. The second is to standardize the data model, through the overall analysis of the physical and digital product flow to establish a green and low-carbon data space for the vertical industries. The third is to improve technology integration, with transmission and security as its foundation base, and data model, data collection, data identifiers, and key processes such as issuance, storage, and verification as the backbone framework, so as to comprehensively integrate new-generation information technology and empower the full perception and transmission of green and low-carbon data. The fourth is to advance the system construction, taking the data collection, data management, evaluation and application, and data exchange of the DPP as the key elements, forging a safe and trusted data service network characterized by multi-party participation and intelligent collaboration.

The CAICT conducted a series of preliminary work around the DPP. First, technical research was consolidated. The CAICT studied and released the “Technology Development Report of Digital Product Passport (DPP)”, carrying out systematic research and technology layout from the perspective of the key technologies involved in the DPP. Second, industrial ecology was forged. It united key industry organizations such as batteries, textiles, and steel to accelerate the construction and implementation of the DPP system in China. Third, international cooperation was reinforced. The CAICT established a long-term working exchange mechanism with the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) on the DPP and transparent sustainable supply chain business. Relevant standard development work was carried out under the guidance of ISO, IEC, ITU, and other international standardization technical organizations.

In the next step, the CAICT will work together with all partners to strongly advance three crucial tasks including the construction of the DPP registration and management system, the exploration of the DPP application scenarios, and the coordination of international mutual recognition of the DPP. They will target key industries such as batteries, textiles, steel, and electronics, on the basis of key regions with huge international trade demand, within the principle of connectivity, security and trust, and international mutual recognition, thus committing to facilitate the construction of a comprehensive DPP service system and industrial ecology.