Comment: techUK welcomes UK remaining in CEN and CENELEC after Brexit

The BSI Group will remain members of two key European standards bodies, keeping the UK at the heart of European standards setting, writes techUK CEO Julian David.

CEN and CENELEC may not be household names but are two bodies that play a huge role in facilitating trade via the development of European standards. These organisations play a fundamental role in product development and international trade as they provide innovators with consistent specifications that can be understood and are industry led.

European standards

European standards underpin the digital economy and beyond. Without these standards, trains wouldn’t run properly, air traffic control wouldn’t be able to operate across borders and wind turbines would stop working.

Closer to home they ensure toasters don’t burn out, enable smart thermostats to talk to boilers, make satellite TV display properly and that your electronic devices can connect to your router.

Overall standards ensure products are safe, high quality, eco-friendly and (crucially for tech) that products can talk to each other – in other words standards make stuff work and whatever you’re reading this on has benefited from this.

CEN and CENELEC

With CEN and CENELEC collectively managing 20,000 European standards (which often become the global standard), the UK needs to be at the table in designing and maintaining these standards. As CEN and CENELEC are European (though not EU) bodies there were concerns that the UK, via the British Standards Institute (BSI), would no longer be able to participate. Therefore, the announcement confirming the UK will remain members is an extremely positive step for the UK business community.

The agreement reached last Friday means UK industry can continue to sit on committees, act as conveners or chairs and be able to shape and maintain the standards that are vital for the tech sector. techUK has over 100 representatives on various BSI committees, many of which are feeding directly into CEN and CENELEC and this decision means the UK industry voice will remain listened to.

Participation in standards development is a good demonstration of ‘soft power’ so without the BSI at the table shaping standards the UK tech sector would be severely disadvantaged. With new innovations in cloud, IoT, smart devices, 5G, cyber and blockchain all undergoing standardisation this is great news and I congratulate the BSI on their campaign.

Julian David, techUK CEO

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