Battery-Passport Supplier-Readiness Director

The mandate

The company can assemble a customer battery record but cannot consistently retrieve the source evidence behind active material, cell and pack claims when a supplier corrects a lot, changes a processor or splits output across plants. Procurement questionnaires gather annual declarations while product identity changes by batch and configuration. The defined problem is to make 64 suppliers operationally ready for the European Commission's live Digital Product Passport registry context and 2027 battery-passport milestone, not to build a passport platform or interpret regulation.

The deliverable is a supplier-readiness operating book containing evidence ownership, material and component identity, lot-to-product association, source and processor changes, carbon and recycled-content input states, critical-material provenance interfaces, correction propagation, retention, access, confidentiality and escalation. It includes six supplier archetypes, 24 traced battery cases and a controlled readiness score. Legal opinions, third-party assurance, supplier selection, product certification and software implementation are excluded.

Milestone one, at month one, reconciles products, suppliers and required evidence classes. Milestone two, at month two, provides identity, source and correction rules. Milestone three, at month four, completes twelve supplier cases and tests one processor change. Milestone four, at month six, traces twelve further cases and a recycled-feedstock correction. Milestone five, at month seven, submits the accepted book, supplier playbooks and 180-day adoption backlog.

Acceptance requires Procurement, Quality, Product Compliance and supplier owners to reproduce all 24 cases from finished battery identifier to relevant cell, component, material, source input and controlled evidence without relying on a static annual declaration. Two correction exercises must identify every affected battery population and prevent an obsolete claim from remaining visible. The council accepts when all six supplier archetypes meet thresholds and authorised specialists confirm their regulatory, assurance and disclosure boundaries.

The client will provide product structures, battery and cell identifiers, supplier and processor lists, purchase and lot records, declarations, carbon and recycled-content inputs, provenance files, changes, customer requests and current authorised requirements. It will nominate functional owners, secure ten reviews and provide platform access for testing. Management retains supplier awards, product release, regulatory interpretation, assurance, customer disclosure and technology investment authority.

Why this is external work

Procurement sees commercial suppliers, Quality sees approved parts and product teams see a finished configuration, while passport questions cross all three and extend into confidential upstream processors. The startup cannot divert its scale-up leadership into seven months of supplier evidence design. Independent operating architecture can expose source breaks without selling a registry, verifier or traceability service.

What you will own

• Reconcile 64 suppliers across approved source, processor, material, component, cell, pack, product and evidence ownership.
• Define identity and inheritance rules for batches, split lots, blended feedstock, configuration changes and recycled inputs.
• Trace 24 battery cases from finished identifier to controlled supporting evidence and named supplier correction routes.
• Design readiness thresholds for availability, granularity, currency, confidentiality, assurance status, retention and correction speed.
• Exercise a processor change and recycled-feedstock correction through every affected product, customer and passport input.
• Separate supplier remediation from legal interpretation, independent assurance, product release, disclosure and platform implementation.
• Deliver the accepted operating book, archetype playbooks, scorecards, owner training and funded 180-day backlog.

Candidate qualifications

• Designed supplier evidence for batteries, automotive products or another regulated multi-tier manufactured product at scale.
• Has traced material or carbon claims through cell, component and finished-product identity after an upstream source changed.
• Understands bills of material, lots, processors, recycled inputs, carbon evidence, confidentiality and correction propagation operationally.
• Can work to authorised passport requirements without offering legal, certification, assurance or software-implementation services.
• Has rejected annual supplier declarations when product-level evidence and actual change control could not support them.
• Delivered supplier-readiness methods that procurement and quality teams sustained through launch growth and configuration change.

Non-negotiables

• Can complete ten supplier, plant or recycling-interface reviews and 24 traced cases within seven months.
• Will disclose interests involving battery suppliers, traceability platforms, recyclers, assurance firms and automotive customers.
• Accepts Procurement, Quality, Product Compliance, legal, assurance, disclosure and investment authority boundaries.
• Brings battery or complex-product supplier evidence; generic ESG reporting experience alone is insufficient.

1. 49 words maximum. Describe a product claim you withdrew after an upstream processor or material lot changed.
2. 49 words maximum. How would you propagate one recycled-feedstock correction through affected battery identifiers?
3. 49 words maximum. Which supplier evidence should never be inherited from an annual corporate declaration?