CECRA, the European Council for Motor Trades and Repairs, has welcomed the European Commission’s Communication on Europe’s data economy adopted on January 10 which promises to "improve access to anonymous machine-generated data” and "minimise lock-in effects”.

The repairer association is particularly satisfied with the content and the timeliness of the European Commission’s initiative. Over the last few months, along with other stakeholders including consumers, leasing companies and aftermarket distributors, it has been calling for an equal access to vehicle data that would allow the rise of a wide range of new services based on the capability of vehicles to generate data. These may include remote diagnostics, predictive maintenance, usage-based insurances and many others.

CECRA say ensuring safety and security is crucial for the deployment of connected vehicles and believes that an ‘in-vehicle interoperable, standardised, secure and open-access platform’ is the right way forward. This solution would ensure the highest level of safety, security, liability and data protection whilst safeguarding competition, innovation and consumer’s freedom of choice.

While CECRA and its partners have welcomed the document, there are still many concerns over data access. The European Commission communication states that in some cases manufacturers holding data, keep the data generated by their machines or through their products and services for themselves, thus restricting reuse in downstream markets. CECRA  believes this well represents the difficulties that the independent aftermarket is currently faced with when looking to gain access to on board vehicle data. It points out that at present vehicle telematics systems are currently being designed in such a way that only vehicle manufacturers are allowed to directly access the vehicle-generated data and that none of the access solutions proposed by the vehicle manufacturers are adequate to allow true competition and independent innovation. The organisations says the current system also restricts  the consumer’s right to decide who they share their data with.

As such CECRA and its alliance partners are calling for an urgent European legislative instrument, mandating the adoption of an ‘Open Telematics Platform’.

CECRA says it is pleased to see that the issue has eventually been included among the main European Commission’s priorities and is looking forward to discovering what are going to be the next steps. 9th of June 2017 could be a crucial date in the Commission’s path towards an equal access to vehicle data. At this time according to art. 12 of the eCall Regulation "the Commission shall assess the need of requirements for an interoperable, standardised, secure and open-access platform  and shall adopt a legislative initiative based on those requirements.”