Impact Pathways: Digital Product Passport for embedding circularity in electronics supply chains

Purpose – This impact pathways paper identifies drivers and barriers for digital product passport (DPP) applications in electronics supply chains and to derive future research pathways.

Methodology – 39 interviews were conducted with three Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) and their suppliers, customers, recycling partners, DPP service providers and an international standards organisation.

Findings - The results show the four key drivers for DPP adoption: improved decision making to transition towards a circular economy, ensuring regulatory compliance, improving transparency across the supply chain, and enhancing customer engagement. Four main barriers exist: developing and communicating the business case for DPP adoption, increased need for data, data standards and ensuring interoperability between systems, the extent of implementation effort needed and ensuring data security and integrity.

Originality/value – This is one of the earliest papers to concisely summarise the main drivers and barriers of DPP adoption and present a comprehensive research agenda for operations and supply chain management.