What is a market participant in the digital product passport?
A market participant is the broad legal term for any party involved in placing, trading or making available a product within the European Union. It is not a separate title that one company receives, but an umbrella term that encompasses different roles: the manufacturer, the authorised representative, the importer and the distributor. Which role applies to your company determines under the digital product passport regulation who is responsible for supplying, keeping current and making accessible the data.
The term is not new and was not invented for the product passport; it already appears in other European product legislation, such as rules on product safety and market surveillance. The digital product passport regulation builds on this and links each role within the term market participant to its own set of obligations regarding the passport.
Why this distinction is made
The legislator did not want to designate one company per product as the sole responsible party, because a product often reaches the consumer through multiple links in the chain. For example, a manufacturer outside the EU needs an authorised representative to act on its behalf, an importer places the product on the EU market, and a distributor sells it further without manufacturing or importing it itself. By giving each link in the chain its own position within the term market participant, it is clear who must be able to show or pass on which data at which time.
That distinction is particularly relevant when something goes wrong: an inspection by a supervisory authority, a question from a customer, or a change to the product that must be incorporated into the passport. Whoever is then designated as a market participant for that specific product determines who is called upon.
Market participant versus provider of the passport
It is important not to confuse market participant with the party that technically hosts or provides the passport. A market participant is responsible for the accuracy and currency of the data; the provider of the digital product passport ensures the technical infrastructure on which that data is made accessible via the QR code or other data carrier. In practice, both roles can be organised separately, and the regulation sets requirements for both, but they are not the same.
For a company that both manufactures and imports, it may be that it qualifies as a manufacturer for one product and as an importer for another. The role is thus determined per product and per situation, not once for the entire company.
What this means in practice
If your company places products in multiple product groups on the market, it is advisable to establish per product line which role within the term market participant applies. This is not always obvious: a company that has a product manufactured under its own brand, but completely outsources production, may still qualify as a manufacturer. If a company only resells the product without modifications, it is more likely to fall under distributor, typically with lighter obligations than the manufacturer or importer.
Because this classification has implications for what is expected of you regarding the product passport, it is wise not to rush through this. in five questions see which role fits your situation provides a first indication, without you needing an account straight away.
Where you will find the precise classification
The regulation itself elaborates the definitions of manufacturer, authorised representative, importer and distributor, along with the corresponding obligations per role. Because the text is formulated in legal terms and does not always align one-to-one with how a company is organised in practice, it is useful to place the official definitions alongside your own business operations. the concepts looked up per situation in the knowledge bank provides an overview per subject for this purpose, with a reference to the source in the official text each time.
Please note that the classification is not always straightforward in some cases, for example with own-brand products or complex import structures. In those cases, consultation with a lawyer or with the competent supervisory authority is the appropriate course of action; a platform such as ours can provide the definitions and the source, but cannot make a pronouncement on your specific situation.
How this comes together in the passport itself
Once it is established which role applies, this does not change the content of the passport itself, but rather who supplies the data and who remains responsible if the product changes. You can read more about how that data flow works in practice and where the information in a passport comes from on the page where the information comes from.
If you are still uncertain whether and how this applies to your company, the free quick-scan is an accessible first step, or the most frequently asked questions about the product passport to quickly see whether your question has already been answered there.