DPP Ph. D. Research

Q19b DPP and Fashion or Textile – ChatGPT interpretation

Query on ChatGPT: “attached is a CSV file with the Scopus´ exported results for the following query “Q19b. TITLE-ABS-KEY(((“digital product passport” OR “product passport”) AND (fashion OR textile*))), which was limited to sources for “Business, Management and Accounting”; and “Economics, Econometrics and Finance” inside the Scopus Query. Therefore, I want you to analyse titles and abstracts, similar to the one you performed above, in order for us to turn this into either: a manuscript-ready synthesis subsection, and start building a scientific “systematic mapping review” to present it at a “Fashion and Textile Congress” in Madrid on April the 20th, in a Textile Congres at the University of Santiago de Compostela on April the 14th, and then to send it to an International Journal”

Response: “I analyzed the Scopus CSV you uploaded for Q19b at the title + abstract level.

Executive reading

This is a small but very promising emerging corpus: 14 records from 2023–2026, heavily concentrated in 2025. It is not yet a mature standalone literature, which is actually good news for you: there is still room to shape the field conceptually.

What the corpus suggests overall

The DPP-in-fashion/textiles literature in Business, Management and Accounting / Economics, Econometrics and Finance is currently organized around five main conversations:

  1. DPP as traceability and transparency infrastructure
  2. DPP as a consumer communication and retail tool
  3. DPP as a blockchain-enabled technical architecture
  4. DPP as a strategic instrument for the twin transition
  5. DPP as an adoption/compliance challenge for firms

The most important insight is this:

In this business/management/economics subset, DPP is not yet primarily theorized as a full interoperable governance infrastructure. It is more often framed as a tool for traceability, transparency, communication, compliance, and market differentiation.

That gives us a very strong opening for a systematic mapping review and later journal article.

1. Basic profile of the corpus
Corpus size: 14 documents
Years:

  1. 2023: 3
  2. 2024: 1
  3. 2025: 8
  4. 2026: 2

Document types:

  1. Articles: 10
  2. Conference papers: 2
  3. Review: 1
  4. Book chapter: 1

Immediate interpretation

This is a very recent and fast-forming niche. The spike in 2025 suggests that DPP in fashion/textiles is transitioning from policy anticipation into an identifiable academic topic.

That matters for our strategy:

  1. for the USC textile congress, this is timely and novel
  2. for Madrid, it is suitable as a systematic mapping review / emerging field map
  3. for a later journal submission, it can be developed into a stronger conceptual synthesis or systematic review article

2. The main thematic clusters

Cluster A. DPP as traceability and supply-chain transparency

This is the core backbone of the corpus.

Representative papers:

  1. Exploring the role of digital product passports for supply chain traceability in the “Made in Italy” textile sector (Acciai E., 2025) ver
  2. The fashion product passport: In search of the “killer app” (Chrimes & Heim, 2023) (supply chain transparency) ver
  3. How a turtle could change the textile industry (Pfaff T., 2023)

What this cluster says:

This stream treats DPP primarily as a mechanism to:

  1. improve supply chain traceability
  2. support transparency
  3. make sustainability-related product histories more visible
  4. help fashion firms deal with fragmented and often opaque chains

Why it matters for our research?

This cluster supports our broader argument that information asymmetry is a major barrier in fashion-textile systems. But it also shows a limitation in the current literature:

  1. many papers emphasize visibility
  2. fewer explain the deeper governance, interoperability, and ecosystem coordination conditions needed to make DPP actually work across the life cycle

That is one of our best contribution points.

Cluster B. DPP as consumer communication and behavioral influence

This is one of the most interesting findings in this dataset.

Representative papers:

  1. Bridging Digital Product Passports and in-store experiences: How augmented reality enhances decision comfort and reuse intentions (Jeganathan K & Szymkowiak, 2025) ver 
  2. Fashion and Product Literacy: The Case of Blockchain Technology and Digital Product Passport as a Communication Tool (Lepp et. al., 2026) ver
  3. Digital product passports for cleaner production: Economic evidence from producers and consumers in the fashion industry (Becchi et. al., 2026) ver
    What this cluster says

A significant portion of this literature moves beyond operations and looks at DPP as a way to:

  1. improve consumer understanding
  2. reduce uncertainty at point of sale
  3. increase trust
  4. strengthen product literacy
  5. influence reuse intentions
  6. support willingness to pay for sustainable products

Key insight:

This is not just a backend data infrastructure literature. It is also a market communication literature.

That is important because it gives us a dual framing:

  1. back-end: DPP as lifecycle data and traceability infrastructure
  2. front-end: DPP as a consumer-facing signal and communication device

Theoretical opportunity

Most of these papers still appear to treat communication as downstream from data, but they do not fully theorize:

  1. how information quality is governed
  2. how credibility is established across actors
  3. how consumers can trust the passport if upstream data are fragmented or weakly standardized

That gap aligns perfectly with our governance-centered approach.

Cluster C. Blockchain as enabling architecture

Representative papers:

  1. Blockchain technology adoption in the fashion supply chain: a review on the practices of fashion brands (Tam F.Y., 2025) ver
  2. Blockchain-based digital product passport: design principles and demonstration (Abreu H., et. al., 2025) ver
  3. Fashion and Product Literacy: The Case of Blockchain Technology and Digital Product Passport as a Communication Tool (Lepp M.-S. et. al., 2026) ver

 

What this cluster says

Blockchain is one of the most visible technical anchors in this corpus. It is associated with:

  1. traceability
  2. transparency
  3. trust
  4. immutable histories
  5. multi-actor information exchange

The design principles and demonstration paper is particularly important because it suggests movement from conceptual discussion toward prototype-oriented, end-to-end DPP design.

Most relevant insight

Even here, the discussion seems more about technology choice than about full interoperable governance design.

In other words:

  1. blockchain is often proposed as a solution
  2. but the literature is still thinner on semantic interoperability, shared standards, data rights, governance arrangements, and institutional coordination

So our research should be careful not to collapse DPP into blockchain. The stronger position is:

blockchain may be one possible infrastructure component, but DPP should be understood more broadly as a socio-technical governance architecture.

Cluster D. DPP as a strategic instrument for the twin transition

Representative papers:

  1. An Integrated Business Strategy for the Twin Transition: Leveraging Digital Product Passports and Circular Economy Models (D’Adamo I., 2025) ver
  2. Environmental Concerns in the Fashion Industry: A Twin Transition With the Digital Product Passport (Colasante A., 2025) ver
  3. Sustainability Challenges and Opportunities in Luxury Fashion: A Response to Policy Deregulation in the United States (Hepner J.L., 2025) ver

What this cluster says

This stream links DPP to:

  1. the green and digital twin transition
  2. strategic alignment
  3. sustainability regulation
  4. circular economy models
  5. competitiveness in changing regulatory environments

Why this matters

This is probably the cluster closest to our own research orientation.

It suggests that DPP is starting to be viewed not merely as:

  1. a label
  2. a compliance artifact
  3. a traceability gadget

but as a strategic instrument that may shape:

  1. business models
  2. sustainability strategy
  3. market access
  4. firm adaptation to regulation
  5. Important caveat

Even in this cluster, the business model dimension is still emerging. The link to circular business model innovation is not yet deeply developed.

That creates a strong opening for us.

Cluster E. Implementation barriers and firm readiness

Representative papers:

  1. An overview of technological challenges in implementing the digital product passport in the textile and clothing industry (Domskienė J. 2024) ver
  2. Industry 4.0 Technologies Revolutionising Footwear: Paving the Path to Circularity Through Innovative Services (Monteiro L. et. al., 2025) ver

What this cluster says

This stream is focused on:

  1. implementation barriers
  2. technological options
  3. tag/data carrier choices
  4. firm readiness
  5. regulatory uncertainty
  6. opportunities for service innovation

One particularly useful insight is that firms appear interested in DPP-related digitization but are still waiting for clearer regulatory guidance and practical standards.

Why this is important

This gives us a grounded empirical narrative:

  1. adoption is not blocked only by lack of willingness; it is also blocked by uncertainty about standards, requirements, coordination rules, and implementation pathways.

That is highly useful for a systematic mapping review because it highlights barriers/enablers as a major coding dimension.

3. The most important insights for our research:

Insight 1. This is an emerging field, not a mature one

With only 14 records and a strong concentration in 2025–2026, this is clearly an emerging domain.

Meaning for us:

We are not entering an overcrowded literature. We are helping define it.

That is valuable for:

  1. a congress presentation
  2. a mapping review
  3. a later conceptual or systematic review journal article

Insight 2. The literature is still more managerial and application-oriented than infrastructural

The corpus talks a lot about:

  1. traceability
  2. transparency
  3. consumer trust
  4. sustainability communication
  5. adoption barriers
  6. strategic implications

It talks much less about:

  1. semantic interoperability
  2. governance structures
  3. data stewardship
  4. institutional design
  5. lifecycle data orchestration
  6. commons/governance approaches to shared product data

Meaning for us:

“Our infrastructure/governance lens is not redundant. It is needed.”

Insight 3. DPP is strongly tied to the EU regulatory horizon

Many of these papers are clearly shaped by the EU policy context and the expectation of mandatory DPP-related developments in textiles.

Meaning for us:

Our work can frame the field not only as a technology trend, but as a regulation-driven market, governance transformation and institutional innovation.

That is especially suitable for a European congress audience.

Insight 4. Consumer-side effects are becoming central

The AR, literacy, and willingness-to-pay papers show that DPP is increasingly being studied as part of:

  1. sustainable consumption
  2. retail communication
  3. purchase support
  4. reuse/circular behaviors

Meaning for us:

For congress audiences, this is very useful because it broadens DPP beyond compliance and supply chains.

We can show that DPP has implications for:

  1. firms
  2. consumers
  3. market signaling
  4. circular behavior

Insight 5. The business-model link is still underdeveloped

Even though “strategy” and “twin transition” appear, there is still limited deep explanation of how DPP enables:

  1. new revenue logics
  2. service-based models
  3. product-service systems
  4. resale/rental/repair ecosystems
  5. ecosystem-level value capture

Meaning for us

This is one of the clearest gaps we can occupy.

4. The key gaps we can explicitly state:

These are, in my view, the strongest gaps emerging from this dataset:

Gap A. Interoperability is implied more than theorized

The papers frequently assume that data can be collected, shared, and used across the chain, but they do not always explain:

  1. how interoperability is achieved
  2. how actors coordinate around common data structures
  3. how information quality is maintained

Gap B. Governance remains underdeveloped

The corpus talks about transparency and traceability, but much less about:

  1. who owns the data
  2. who updates it
  3. who verifies it
  4. who gets access
  5. how conflicts and asymmetries are managed

Gap C. DPP is often treated as a tool, not as an institution

Many papers frame DPP as:

  1. communication tool
  2. traceability tool
  3. strategic tool
  4. compliance tool

But fewer frame it as:

  1. an institutional infrastructure
  2. a coordination mechanism
  3. a governance arrangement
  4. a market-shaping information system

Gap D. Circular business model innovation is still weakly integrated

The link between DPP and circular economy is present, but the mechanisms connecting DPP data to business model redesign are still not well developed.

5. Manuscript-ready synthesis subsection

Here is a draft subsection we can already reuse and refine:

Emerging business and management literature on digital product passports in fashion and textiles

The Scopus corpus restricted to Business, Management and Accounting and Economics, Econometrics and Finance reveals that research on Digital Product Passports (DPPs) in fashion and textiles remains an emerging but rapidly expanding field. The retrieved publications are highly recent, with most contributions concentrated in 2025 and 2026, indicating that this topic is transitioning from policy anticipation to a recognisable scholarly domain. Across the corpus, DPPs are primarily framed as mechanisms for improving supply chain traceability, transparency, and sustainability communication, particularly in relation to the European regulatory agenda and the twin green-digital transition.

A first prominent stream conceptualises DPPs as infrastructures for supply chain traceability and transparency. These studies focus on the capacity of product passports to make product histories more visible across fragmented textile value chains, especially in contexts such as Made in Italy fashion. A second stream highlights DPPs as consumer-facing communication devices. Here, the literature connects DPPs with augmented reality, fashion literacy, product literacy, and willingness to pay, suggesting that passports may reduce information asymmetries not only between firms but also between producers and consumers. A third stream is more technology-oriented, often linking DPPs with blockchain-based architectures to support trust, traceability, and data integrity. However, these contributions tend to privilege specific technological solutions over broader questions of governance and interoperability.

A fourth stream situates DPPs within firm strategy and the twin transition, presenting them as instruments capable of aligning digital transformation with circular economy goals, regulatory compliance, and sustainability positioning. Finally, an implementation-oriented stream addresses practical barriers, including uncertainty regarding standards, data collection requirements, and technology choices such as QR-based smart tags. Taken together, the corpus shows that the current literature increasingly recognises DPPs as relevant for circularity, traceability, and sustainable consumption, but still underdevelops the deeper infrastructural conditions required for effective deployment.

In particular, the literature remains stronger on the functions of transparency and communication than on the governance arrangements that would make DPP systems robust, interoperable, and scalable across textile ecosystems. Questions concerning data ownership, updating responsibilities, semantic alignment, verification, and lifecycle coordination remain insufficiently theorised. Likewise, although circularity is frequently invoked, the mechanisms through which DPP-enabled data infrastructures support circular business model innovation remain only partially articulated. This suggests that future research should move beyond viewing DPPs as isolated digital labels or compliance tools and instead conceptualise them as socio-technical governance infrastructures capable of reducing information asymmetries, coordinating actors across value chains, and enabling more circular and service-oriented textile business models.

6. Starter structure for a systematic mapping review

For your congress paper, I would build the systematic mapping review like this:

Tentative title

Digital Product Passports in Fashion and Textiles: A Systematic Mapping Review of Emerging Business, Management, and Economics Research

Aim

To map how recent business-oriented literature conceptualizes DPPs in fashion and textiles, identify dominant themes, methods, and theoretical orientations, and reveal gaps for future research.

Possible research questions

RQ1. How is the role of the DPP conceptualized in the fashion and textile literature?
RQ2. What thematic clusters dominate the field?
RQ3. What types of methods and evidence are being used?
RQ4. Which dimensions remain underdeveloped, especially regarding interoperability, governance, and circular business model innovation?

Suggested mapping dimensions

For each paper, code:

 

7. A useful thematic map for your presentation

You could present the field as four concentric layers:

Layer 1 — Product visibility

DPP as traceability, transparency, and digital labeling

Layer 2 — Market communication

DPP as literacy tool, retail interface, trust signal, and consumer decision support

Layer 3 — Organizational adoption

DPP as implementation challenge, compliance response, and strategic asset

Layer 4 — Systemic transformation

DPP as governance infrastructure for circular coordination and business model innovation

Your contribution sits most strongly in Layer 4, while the current literature is still concentrated in Layers 1–3.

8. Best positioning for each event
University of Santiago de Compostela, April 14

Emphasize:

  1. the emerging European policy context
  2. textile implications
  3. traceability and implementation barriers
  4. why DPP needs stronger conceptualization as data governance infrastructure
  5. Madrid Fashion and Textile Congress, April 20

Emphasize:

  1. consumer communication
  2. retail implications
  3. luxury/fashion strategy
  4. twin transition
  5. market differentiation and trust

 

Later international journal

Best angle:

  1. systematic mapping review + conceptual gap paper
  2. strongest contribution: DPP beyond traceability, toward governance/interoperability/CBMI

 

9. Bottom line

This Q19b corpus tells a very clear story:

The business-oriented literature on DPPs in fashion and textiles is emerging quickly, but it is still fragmented across traceability, communication, technology, and strategy streams. It recognizes the importance of transparency and circularity, yet still under-theorizes interoperability, governance, and the business model mechanisms through which DPPs could enable circular transformation.

That is an excellent foundation for your review.”