Traceability
What happened, to what, where, when and why
Those five questions are the whole of supply chain traceability, and GS1 EPCIS 2.0 is the vocabulary for answering them in a way your partners' systems can also read. CirculeID uses it as the event layer under every passport.
- Standard
- GS1 EPCIS 2.0
- Serialisation
- JSON-LD
- Query by
- Object identity
Definition
What is supply chain traceability under EPCIS 2.0?
EPCIS 2.0 is the GS1 standard for supply chain event data. Every event records what object was involved, when it happened, where it happened, and the business step it belongs to. Recording a product's journey as EPCIS events makes chain of custody readable by any partner system rather than only your own.
The four dimensions are the standard’s own — what, when, where and why — and they are why an EPCIS event from a logistics provider you have never integrated with is still meaningful when it arrives.
The event model
The four dimensions of an event
| Dimension | What it records | Example |
|---|---|---|
| What | The object or objects involved, by identifier | GTIN 09506000134352, serial SN8817403 |
| When | Event time and the time zone it was recorded in | 2026-03-14T09:22:00+01:00 |
| Where | The location it occurred, and the business location after | Dyeing facility, Porto |
| Why | The business step and the resulting disposition | Commissioning · active |
Capabilities
What the event layer gives you
Aggregation and transformation
Model components becoming an assembly, and raw material becoming product, without losing the link back.
Location and geolocation
Business locations for logistics, and plot-level coordinates where EUDR due diligence requires them.
Partner ingestion
Partners send CSV, EDI or their own API shapes; those map to EPCIS events on receipt rather than blocking on adoption.
Query by object
Retrieve the full history of one identifier, which is the question an audit and a recall both start from.
Append-only history
Events are added, never overwritten, so a figure that changed still shows what it was and when.
Recall scoping
Trace forward from an affected batch to every downstream object, and backward from a product to its inputs.
Implementation
Getting events flowing
- 01
Map your own steps
Your WMS and MES already record receipt, production and dispatch. Those become EPCIS events with no new data capture.
- 02
Onboard tier one
Direct suppliers and logistics partners send events in whatever shape they have; mapping happens on receipt.
- 03
Reach the origin
Where a regulation demands it — EUDR plots, battery cell origin — go further upstream for that specific evidence only.
- 04
Bind to the passport
Events attach to the product identity, so the passport shows current state and the history that produced it.
Answers
Frequently asked questions
What is EPCIS 2.0?
EPCIS is the GS1 standard for sharing supply chain event data. Each event answers four questions: what object, when, where, and why — the business step it belongs to. Version 2.0 adds JSON and JSON-LD serialisations and web-friendly APIs, which is what makes it practical to use as the event layer under a Digital Product Passport.
Why use a standard event model instead of our own?
Because traceability only has value across organisational boundaries. A proprietary event schema requires every partner to integrate specifically with you; an EPCIS 2.0 event can be produced and consumed by systems that have never heard of you. The standard is the reason the data survives a change of logistics provider.
Do our suppliers have to adopt EPCIS to participate?
No. Many will send CSV exports, EDI messages or API calls in their own shapes, and CirculeID maps those into EPCIS events on receipt. Partners who already emit EPCIS can send it directly. Requiring standard adoption before anything works is how traceability programmes stall at tier one.
How does traceability relate to the passport itself?
The passport is the current state; the events are how it got there. A recycled-content figure is a claim, and the chain of custody events are what make it credible. For EUDR in particular, the due diligence statement depends on being able to connect a consignment to the plot it was harvested from.
How much event volume can this handle?
Event volume scales with reads, not products — a single pallet moving through a distribution network can generate more events than a thousand items sitting in a warehouse. The event store is designed for append-heavy workloads and queried by object identity, which is the access pattern traceability actually produces.
Next step
Trace one product line end to end
Bring the events you already record. We will show you the chain of custody they produce and where the gaps are.