VDA Product Compliance Volume 2 (2026) – Product Safety and Product Conformity

About This Publication

The shared goal of the VDA and its members is to continuously ensure the compliance of their products in a global market while protecting people and the environment as well as preventing hazards. For the purposes of this recommendation, Product Compliance (PC) includes so-called binding obligations, namely all applicable legal obligations and those voluntarily entered into by the company.

Product Compliance is crucial for a company's business success and should therefore be ensured for the products provided. This refers to systems, hardware, software and/or services.

Products are becoming more and more complex; there is a growing number of statutory and regulatory requirements and interdependencies in supply chains are increasing. In order to meet these requirements, companies need elements helping them to identify, monitor, control and minimize product-related risks. A Product Compliance System (PCS) is used for this purpose, which is intended to enable the organization to identify and minimize potential risks at an early stage.

The PCS is based on the Three Lines Model and describes the governance function (Second Line), while this VDA volume describes the tasks of the operational departments (First Line) derived from the PCS. People who take on these tasks are called Product Safety and Conformity Representatives (PSCR). It is at the discretion of each company to delegate these tasks through appropriate processes to one or more individuals, functions, or roles within the organisation.