Catena-X and OPC Foundation partner to align OPC UA and cross-industry data interoperability to meet EU digital product passport needs.
The Catena-X Automotive Network e. V. and the OPC Foundation have announced a partnership to support standardized data sharing between companies in the manufacturing industry. The partnership is aligned with the upcoming EU regulation requiring a digital product passport (DPP) by 2027, which calls for trusted, machine-readable product data across value chains.
This cooperation connects two established organizations:
- Catena-X, an open data space for the automotive industry that supports standardized data sharing using interoperable infrastructure and semantic templates, and
- OPC Foundation, a global organization for industrial interoperability and the creator of OPC UA, a widely used standard for secure data exchange.
By aligning OPC UA’s industrial modelling capabilities with Catena-X’s governance framework and cloud-based infrastructure, the two organizations are working to support more consistent data integration, help minimize reporting errors, and support compliance with upcoming regulatory requirements such as the DPP.
The parties agree to cooperate in the following four core areas:
- Semantic integration: Combine OPC UA information modelling and Catena-X semantic templates to create a shared repository of interoperable, machine-readable models. This framework will also enable generation of DPPs directly from production data.
- Open-source reference implementations: Jointly develop and provide open-source reference implementations for selected dataspace and interoperability components, supporting integration of OPC UA-based systems into the Catena-X data environment.
- Reference architecture alignment: Align the OPC Foundation’s Cloud Initiative reference architecture with Catena-X’s dataspace architecture to enable deployment from the shopfloor to the supply chain.
- Industrial ecosystem enablement: Support companies in using their existing OPC UA tools and infrastructure to address emerging regulatory requirements, particularly the DPP, while reducing integration costs and supporting timely compliance.
Download the OPCF Catena-X Whitepaper.
“The OPC Foundation provides rich, secure, and proven access to standardized information – an essential foundation for digital transformation. By linking this data to the Catena-X ecosystem, we turn standardized information into cross-company value. This collaboration benefits both ecosystems and marks a key step toward end-to-end data chains, at scale, and cross-industry solutions, like the digital product passport.” says Oliver Ganser, chairman of the board at Catena-X.
Stefan Hoppe, president and executive director of OPC Foundation, continued “This collaboration brings together two strong ecosystems: OPC UA, as a globally accepted standard for industrial interoperability, and Catena-X, as a pioneering data-space initiative for the automotive industry. The combination of proven standardization and sovereign data exchange provides companies with a practical bridge from the shopfloor to the cloud. Catena-X contributes significant added value—particularly in meeting regulatory requirements such as the digital product passport and enabling cross-company use of data models, which is also a key pillar of the OPC Foundation’s Cloud Initiative.”
Edited by Puja Mitra, WTWH Media, for Control Engineering, from a OPC Foundation news release.
