Practical experience implementing BOMcheck - The Philips case

Philips has asked its suppliers to declare their compliance with REACH, ROHS and other requirements by making BOMcheck declarations, with a preference for Full Material Declarations. The roll out started in March 2010 and more than 1200 Philips suppliers have started to make declarations, mainly regulatory compliance declarations. There are a number of hurdles to overcome such as awareness raising, confidentiality issues, and refusals to join BOMcheck. A further challenge is how to import the data from BOMcheck into the product design tools (PLM systems) to enable designers to include the declarations in their eco-design decisions. This paper identifies the challenges and solutions over the last 2.5 years.