15 Criteria for Choosing DPP Software

The DPP platform market is young and crowded, ranging from enterprise giants to self-serve tools at a few hundred euros a month. Every demo looks good. The differences emerge in these 15 questions.

Standards and compliance

1. How do you demonstrate conformity with EN 18219/18220/18222? Demand a concrete answer. See the DPP standards guide.
2. Is registry submission automated? See registering a DPP step by step.
3. Can I define access tiers at field level? See DPP access rights.
4. Are version queries supported? "Can I retrieve the version as of a date through the API?" See EN 18222.
5. Is signing supported? See eIDAS and signing.

Data ownership and exit

1. Who owns the data? Is it explicit in the contract?
2. Is full data export free and available at any time?
3. Whose domain is in the printed QR? It should be yours. See what a resolver service is.
4. What happens to links if the contract ends? Is the exit plan written down?
5. What is the backup and persistence arrangement? See data persistence and backup.

Operations

1. How does ERP/PLM integration work? Bulk import and API. See ERP integration for DPP.
2. Is there a supplier portal? Data collection is the biggest work item. See collecting data from suppliers.
3. How is multilingual content handled? See multilingual passports.
4. Are there product group templates? Textiles, batteries, furniture.
5. Does the pricing model match your volume profile? See the cost guide.

Red flags

• A vendor that says "we are standards compliant" but cannot name a clause.
• A contract that treats data export as a paid service.
• QR codes that can only be printed on the vendor's domain.
• An interface that shows "current state" instead of version history.
• A data model that does not record provenance.

Frequently asked questions