Recycling concepts have been around for ages. In the age of manufacturing and assembly lines, greater emphasis on recycling was brought forth in the 1970’s and 1980’s as a growing number of cars and trucks stacked up in junkyards.

The materials in these cars could be recycled, but the level of effort was not easy back then. You have to break the vehicle down into its components. But even then, what materials are in those components? How should they be recycled or if necessary, disposed?

Enter the International Material Data System. IMDS was created by some of the best automotive manufacturers in the world. They include Ford, Volkswagen, Volvo, BMW, Opel, DXC, Daimler, Audi and Porsche. Through their collaboration, they created a database to record the base materials used to manufacture a vehicle. This allowed recyclers to properly break down the components and return to plants for reuse.

It is not easy to bring together such strong rivals – there are few rivalries as fierce as those in the automotive industry. Nonetheless, everyone could agree that recycling and helping to conserve resources was the right thing to do.

In the year 2000, the European Union created the End of Life Vehicles (ELV) Directive. This required all automotive companies to adhere to the IMDS standards.

Today, an IMDS number is required for virtually any automotive material used across the world. This number provides the reference information needed for proper recycling or disposal of the material.

Also today, virtually every vehicle on the road is composed of mostly recycled materials, thanks to the IMDS.

Suppliers and providers of the materials have the added burden of providing an IMDS number for their goods whenever used for automotive manufacturing. This process involves documenting the material and outlining any specific requirements for recycling or disposal.

If done manually, the IMDS process can take a lot of time and can be prone to error. But there are easier ways to handle IMDS submissions!

IMDS Automation

Keeping automation in mind, APA Engineering developed an exclusive software called ‘MDS Xpress’ that can streamline and mitigate automotive compliance risk for IMDS submission.

MDS Xpress saves a minimum of 30% cost with diligent supplier follow up, proactive Build of Material (BOM) analysis and many more features.

Benefits of using MDS Xpress-

● 70% time savings in building the IMDS tree structure

● Faster supplier submission using automated communication

● 100% assurance on the accuracy of data submitted

APA Engineering’s IMDS solution can be used for ANY manufacturer – whether they are automotive or not. This easy solution leverages the APA Engineering team’s 200+ man-years of experience in automotive compliance with superior technology tools to deliver the needed IMDS data promptly and accurately.

To learn more about APA Engineering and their IMDS solution, contact us!