Standards in Transition

The development and adaptation of standards is in an intensive phase. New regulatory requirements, increased focus on inclusion, and ongoing digitalization are changing how standards are regulated, developed, and implemented. These changes are currently shaping the future of standardization and influencing how companies handle compliance, safety, and innovation.

Ahead of the upcoming Machinery Regulation, extensive work is underway to review and adapt around 800 standards. This is a clear example of how standardization serves as a tool for putting legal requirements into practice.

The aim is to make safety requirements more applicable while ensuring they do not hinder innovation or competitiveness. For companies, this means that standards will continue to be central to interpreting and meeting regulatory requirements and to achieving a high level of safety in machinery and equipment.

The digitalization of standards is another key area of development. Work on SMART standards (Machine Applicable, Readable, and Transferable) is underway within CEN and CENELEC and is entering a new phase.

Traditionally, standards have been written in continuous text without a common structure. SMART introduces a more structured, machine-readable format, enabling automatic extraction and use of requirements in digital tools.

This opens up new workflows where standards can be directly integrated into design processes, risk assessments, and other system tools. The result is more efficient implementation, reduced interpretation risks, and improved traceability.

Learn more about SMART standards at ISO or CENELEC.

Another clear development trend is making standards more inclusive. Historically, many standards have assumed a “typical user,” often based on male norms, meaning products and systems haven’t always worked equally well for everyone.

International efforts toward so-called gender-aware standards aim to change this. By considering physiological, biological, and social differences, standards can help make products, services, and processes both safer and more accessible.

To support this work, a guide is now available that serves as a mandatory checklist when developing or revising standards. The aim is to make it easier for all standards developers to account for these considerations.

Together, these three trends show how standardization is evolving along multiple paths: supporting upcoming regulations, promoting inclusion, and driving digital transformation.

For companies and organizations, this presents both new opportunities and new obligations. Staying updated on developments in standardization is therefore increasingly important for working efficiently, safely, and competitively.

At Cedoc, we actively respond to these trends by building our software for a future where standards are both digital and integrated. Cedoc has always provided a reliable, secure, and robust tool. With the approaching Machinery Regulation, we are elevating the software to the next level, giving users greater control over content while continuing to guide them toward safe and efficient regulatory compliance.

“We view standards as living, interchangeable sources of information rather than static documents, and our goal is to enable import, interpretation, and use of any standard directly within system tools. By supporting machine-readable structures and open integrations, we create conditions for standard requirements to be applied where they are most useful – in risk assessments, design work, and monitoring, regardless of origin or publisher,” explains Andreas Grape, Product Manager at Cedoc.

With this approach, Cedoc aims to reduce manual handling, minimize interpretation risks, and make it easier for users to work in a structured, traceable, and future-proof way as both regulations and standards evolve.