What happens to the digital product passport if my company closes?
The passport remains accessible, even if the company stops
The digital product passport does not disappear as soon as the manufacturer or importer stops using it. The ESPR is designed so that the passport must remain accessible throughout the retention period applicable to the product group, regardless of whether the manufacturer or importer still exists. This is precisely why a passport should not simply be hosted on the company's own website: if that website goes offline when the company ceases to exist, access to the passport disappears with it. The regulation requires a solution that prevents exactly this risk.
Who this applies to, and who it does not
This concerns the accessibility of the passport itself: the data must remain retrievable via the QR code on the product, even after the company ceases operations. It does not concern other consequences of a company closure, such as warranty claims, liability for defects, or what happens to ongoing contracts — these remain subject to ordinary insolvency and contract law, on which the ESPR makes no statements. It also does not concern updating the content: if a company stops, there is no one left to add new information to the passport. The obligation is that the last available data remain consultable, not that someone keeps them current.
Also important is the distinction between a company that ceases to exist entirely and a company that is taken over or continues under a different name. In a takeover, there is generally a legal successor who can assume responsibilities; in a genuine company closure, that is not the case. What happens in that latter case to the role of "responsible market participant" is not something on which a statement is made here — for that, the official text of the regulation is authoritative.
No fixed date yet for furniture
When this obligation becomes concrete for furniture is not yet determined. The delegated act that specifies the requirements for furniture is expected in 2028 according to the European Commission's work plan for 2025-2030. Application to furniture is expected around 2030, but this too is an estimate and not a fixed date. Until that act is published, there is no obligation for furniture to maintain a digital product passport, and therefore no obligation regarding its continuity upon company closure. Once the date is known, it will be stated here.
What this means in practice
For those already thinking about how a passport is set up, the order is roughly as follows. First: critically examine where the passport is hosted. A solution that is entirely dependent on the company's own server infrastructure or domain risks the data becoming inaccessible as soon as that domain is discontinued — and that is precisely what the regulation's accessibility requirement aims to prevent. Second step: think about what happens to hosting in the event of a possible company closure, even if that is not currently a concern — the retention period continues for products already sold, regardless of whether the company still exists then. Third step: for products sold before a company closure, the requirement remains that the passport is retrievable throughout the entire retention period via the QR code on the product, even if there is no active business behind it.
This is exactly the function fulfilled by an independent hosting partner: a third party that hosts the passport independent of the continued existence of the manufacturer or importer, so that the accessibility requirement is met even when the original market participant stops. This is not a legal novelty, but a practical implementation of a requirement that is already implicit in the regulation itself.
The source: Article 10 and Article 13 ESPR
This explanation follows from Article 10 of the ESPR (Regulation (EU) 2024/1781), which sets out the requirements for the digital product passport, including the requirement that the passport remains accessible throughout the specified retention period, regardless of whether the manufacturer or importer continues to exist. Article 13 of the same regulation governs the registry of digital product passports, which provides a central point of reference independent of the systems of individual economic operators. For the precise wording and any exceptions, the official text of the regulation is the source to consult.
What you can do now
If you are choosing a passport solution now, it is best to ask how hosting is arranged in the event that your own business ever stops: will the data remain accessible, and for how long. Once the delegated act for furniture has been published and the date of application is established, this will be supplemented at this location with the concrete time periods that will then apply.
This is based on
- Regulation (EU) 2024/1781 (ESPR), article 10 (requirements for the digital product passport)
- Regulation (EU) 2024/1781 (ESPR), Article 13 (register of digital product passports)
The regulation itself is available on EUR-Lex. We refer per statement; you do not need to believe us.
What you concretely have to do
What is expected of you
A company that ceases operations does not immediately disappear from the world of products it once placed on the market. The ESPR links the obligations regarding the digital product passport to the product, not to the continued existence of the manufacturer or importer. This has practical consequences that often only become apparent when a company is already in the process of winding down, dissolving, or being transferred.
The passport remains in existence, even without an active company
Article 10 of the ESPR (Regulation (EU) 2024/1781) sets requirements for the availability of the product passport. This availability is not linked to whether the company behind the product is still operational. For a furniture maker or importer, this means that the passport for a delivered cabinet, chair, or table must in principle remain accessible, even if the business itself no longer exists. How long that availability must last precisely is described on the page on how long a product passport must remain available. For a company with 10 to 100 employees, this is above all a matter of forward planning: who hosted the passport, and will that party continue to do so if the client ceases operations?
The register keeps a record of who created the passport
Article 13 of the ESPR describes the register of digital product passports, in which data on published passports are entered. More on how that register works is on the page on the European register of digital product passports. In the event of business termination, this is relevant because the registration creates a link between the passport and the party that had it created. A takeover, merger, or restart may therefore change nothing about the content of the passport, but it does change the question of who remains responsible for it.
Transfer of the hosting obligation is something to arrange in advance
For a platform such as ours, which hosted passports on behalf of a manufacturer or importer, the question "what happens when the business ceases" is a question that must be answered in advance — when entering into the agreement, not only when it is terminated. For a business itself, this means that its own service agreement with a passport platform should describe what happens in the event of closure, takeover, or bankruptcy. Without that arrangement there is uncertainty, precisely at the moment when there is little capacity to still deal with it.
A takeover or restart also affects the identification codes
When a business does not cease to exist but is taken over, restarts under a different name, or sells the product line to another party, the question remains how the products remain identifiable. The page on assigning a unique identification code to each product describes how that identification is set up. When transferring business activities, it is important that those identification codes and the associated passports are transferred to the new party, or that it is at least clear with whom the responsibility for existing passports comes to lie.
Where things go wrong in practice
The hosting party of the passport ceases at the same time as (or shortly after) the business itself. When a small platform or an internal IT solution was used to host passports, and that platform disappears without a transfer agreement, the passport is simply no longer accessible — while the furniture remains in use for years to come.
During a restart it is forgotten that old passports also transfer. A new legal entity continues the business activities, but the product passports from before the restart remain "behind" with the old, no longer active entity, without anyone having noticed until a customer or supervisor asks about it.
In a merger, login credentials and management rights disappear. The passport itself may remain online, but no one in the new organization still knows how to access it in order to make changes — relevant at the moment when data must be modified, as described on the page on the modification of data after publication of the product passport.
A curator in bankruptcy has no visibility of the product passport obligation. Product passports are not always regarded as an "asset" requiring attention in a bankruptcy procedure, whilst the products with a passport continue to circulate on the market.
The QR code on the product refers to a domain that no longer exists. Even if the product passport is stored somewhere, it is when the QR code on a piece of furniture no longer works or the underlying address has changed no longer accessible to the end user — a situation that arises in a different way than physical damage to the code, but has the same practical consequence.
What you can put in order now
- An agreement with the hosting party of the product passport describing what happens upon termination, takeover or bankruptcy of the client — including the question of whether hosting is continued and by whom that is paid for.
- An overview of all active product passports, linked to the identification codes of the products, so that upon a transfer it is clear which passports are transferred.
- Management rights and login details for the product passport platform, documented in a place that remains accessible even in the event of staff changes or takeovers — not only held by one employee.
- A clause in takeover or merger documentation on the transfer of responsibility for existing product passports, including registration in the register of digital product passports.
- A note on the link with internal systems, especially when the product passport is connected to an ERP or inventory system — see the page on linking the product passport to an ERP or inventory system — so that upon a system change or takeover it is clear which data comes from where and how that data is transferred.
- Instructions for a potential curator or liquidator, so that the product passport obligation does not go unnoticed in a dissolution or bankruptcy procedure.
Our templates for service agreements and transfer documentation are set up with this in mind, so that a company that has a product passport created today does not discover only upon potential termination that this question remained open.
This is not legal advice. This page provides general information about the legislation that this platform concerns. We do not know your situation. If in doubt about your own case, consult a lawyer or the competent supervisory authority.
Written with AI based on the sources above, reviewed by a human on 2026-08-22. Is something wrong? Let us know — corrections take priority.