Businesses should no longer have to pay to read thousands of technical standards that help them comply with EU law, the European Commission proposed on Tuesday. It also wants to address a problem companies face: new requirements often take effect before they have the information to meet them.

The proposed reform covers specifications used to design, manufacture and test products, from toys to batteries and cybersecurity systems. The Commission estimates annual compliance savings of €300 million. 

“Standards may be technical, but they are also strategic: those who set the standards shape the technologies, products and markets of tomorrow,” Executive Vice-President Stéphane Séjourné said. The proposal aims to help European businesses bring products to market faster and influence the technical rules used internationally.

The law applies, but the instructions arrive late

A law can require a toy to be safe without spelling out every test a manufacturer should perform. A technical standard provides those details. Following a recognised standard gives the company an established way to demonstrate that its product meets the relevant EU requirements.

Companies can use other methods, but must demonstrate that those methods satisfy the law. Standards are therefore particularly useful for smaller businesses with limited resources to develop their own approach. Shared standards also help companies sell the same product across the EU. 

Standards may be technical, but they are also strategic: those who set the standards shape the technologies, products and markets of tomorrow. — Stéphane Séjourné, European Commission Executive Vice-President for Prosperity and Industrial Strategy

The problem is that these documents can take years to become available. The Commission puts the average process at six years and wants to reduce it to four. Meanwhile, businesses may already have to comply with the legislation, leaving them without the technical guidance intended to make that easier.

The proposal would introduce binding deadlines and allow some existing technical documents to be used temporarily while a full standard is being completed. Under specified safeguards and with member states’ approval, the Commission could also ask organisations outside Europe’s three recognised standard-setting bodies to undertake certain work.

Free access raises a funding question

Standards are often sold by the organisations that produce them, even when they provide an important route to complying with public law. The proposal would make around 3,650 standards linked to EU legislation freely accessible through dedicated online repositories. It would not make every European standard free: the organisations’ catalogues contain approximately 27,000.

The Commission’s explainer links the change to EU court rulings establishing that standards referenced in EU legislation form part of EU law and must be available for free. Businesses would gain access to documents they currently may need to purchase before designing or testing their products.

That creates a financing question for the organisations producing the standards. “Harmonised standards only represent a small part of European standardisation organisations’ revenues,” the Commission says. It points to telecommunications standards body ETSI, which already provides its standards free of charge, and suggests that new digital services could provide other income.

The reform would also require national standards bodies to reduce participation costs for smaller companies. Those businesses would gain a stronger opportunity to help write the specifications they will later use. For them, the proposal promises both cheaper access to the finished documents and a greater say in how their products should be designed and tested.

Parliament and EU governments must still agree to the legislation.