Overview: Creating a Blockchain DPP

Digital Product Passports include details of the sustainability information of your product, and are soon to be required for companies that distribute products within the European Union. With a Digital Product Passport, customers scan a QR code on a product, and access sustainability information — like where the product was sourced, details about its manufacturing process, and where it can be recycled.

This guide helps you get started creating a Digital Product Passport on a public ledger (blockchain). To create a Digital Product Passport on a blockchain, follow these four steps below:

Gather sustainability data using DPP Planner
Create a token for your product using Minting
Send DPP Data Events to your token
Create a Token Collection

To learn more about Digital Product Passports, view the article, What is a Digital Product Passport?

1. Gather sustainability data using DPP Planner

Usually, product-level sustainability data is in different areas of your organization: on Web sites, in product documentation, and in other systems.

Organize DPP info using DPP Planner

Using the DPP Planner capability of PicoNext, you can organize your sustainability information and prepare your Digital Product Passport.

Using DPP Planner, you can organize your sustainability information

Create and save products

DPP Planner allows you to create different products, and then save sustainability attributes and associated data for each of those products. You can add data over time to each of these products as you work to collect all the sustainability data you wish to communicate.

DPP Planner allows you to create different products, and then save sustainability attributes for them

Accelerate DPP workflows with pre-defined sustainability templates

DPP Planner has templates and pre-defined attributes you can use to quickly get started adding DPP information to your products. You can add a set of attributes to your product (for example: raw materials, durability, recycling, waste materials) using pre-defined templates for apparel, footwear, batteries, and more. You can also create custom templates with specific sustainability attributes geared to your company.

DPP Planner has templates and pre-defined attributes you can use to quickly get started adding DPP information to your products

More info: DPP Planner

For more information about getting started with DPP Planner, view this article:

Create new DPP Planner Product

2. Create a blockchain DPP for your product using Minting

Minting tokens

Once you've gathered sustainability information using DPP Planner, create a blockchain token with your product information. A token is an entry on a blockchain (public ledger), with your product information — like product name, product description, and an image or video of your product. This process of creating a token on a blockchain is called Minting.

Minting a token means creating an entry on a blockchain (public ledger), with your product information

Characteristics of minting tokens on a blockchain

Creating a token of your product on a blockchain offers several advantages, including transparency and traceability around subsequent updates, data security, data persistence, and data availability. Because blockchains are immutable, however, the data you write to a blockchain cannot be edited. Any corrections must be appended as an additional update. This immutability offers transparency to customers who are viewing your DPP information.

Digital wallets

In order to mint a token on a blockchain, you'll need to have a digital wallet. A digital wallet is a small extension for your browser (or an app on a smartphone) that gives you a unique wallet address. This wallet address is used to identify the data you write to the blockchain.

In addition, to write data to the blockchain, you'll need a small amount of digital currency (for Ethereum, the currency is Ether; for Polygon, the currency is Matic). This digital currency funds the secure confirmation of your transaction data on the blockchain network.

In order to mint a token on a blockchain, you'll need to have a digital wallet.

Viewing your blockchain-based token

Once you've created a token of your product, you can easily view it using the PicoNext Token Explorer capability. Token Explorer retrieves your token data from the relevant blockchain, and renders it in an easily consumable format, without requiring users to download additional apps or install a digital wallet.

PicoNext generates a unique URL for your product that you can use to view your token using the Token Explorer capability. You can also download a QR code that links directly to the token's page on Token Explorer, in order to provide access to your Digital Product Passport directly on your product packaging.

Creating cloud-based DPPs

PicoNext also offers the capability to create cloud-based DPPs that aren't on a blockchain. A link to a discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of Cloud-based DPPs is below.

More info: Minting

For more information about obtaining a digital wallet and minting tokens, view these articles:

3. Send DPP Data Events to your token

With a token of your product created on a blockchain, you can attach the sustainability data you've gathered using DPP Planner to it. Attaching your sustainability data to your token is called sending DPP Data Events.

Associating sustainability info with your token

From DPP Planner, you can stage all the sustainability information you've gathered as DPP Data Events. Then, you can write those DPP Data Events to a blockchain and associate them with your product.

You can write DPP Data Events to a blockchain and associate them with your product.

Displaying DPP Data Events

When you view your product using Token Explorer, it automatically displays the product information you submitted when you minted the token. It also retrieves all the DPP Data Events that have been attached to the product, and displays those below the product information.

Attaching your sustainability data to your token is called sending DPP Data Events

Users can filter the DPP Data Events by the categories you've assigned to them, and they can also sort the DPP Data Events by date.

More info: DPP Data Events

For more information about sending DPP Data Events, view these articles:

Create a Token Collection

Displaying a group of curated tokens

After you've created Digital Product Passports for your products using the steps above, you can curate multiple tokens and display them in a group to users through a Token Collection.

You can curate multiple tokens and display them in a group to users through a Token Collection

Linking to individual token details

A Token Collection displays specific tokens to users, and links to each token's individual detail page that displays product information and DPP Data Events. You can customize details on your Token Collection page, such as its title, description, and associated imagery.

You can download a QR code that links to the Token Collection page, or open a link to the page directly

You can also customize other display information, like the image displayed for your product, within the Token Collection. Finally, you can also copy the unique Token Collection URL to send to your users, or you can download a QR code that links to the Token Collection page.

More info: Token Collections

For more information about Token Collections, view these articles: