Can it really be true? Has eCall finally arrived in Europe? Well in July, the answer was yes and no for both of those questions. Once again the European Union cannot make things simple, and once again the EU has changed its position in regards to eCall.

iSuppli has been following the dizzying array of changes to eCall and documenting it on the Automotive Infotainment Portal and Components & Devices Portal. Along with sources in the decision making process and expert analysis, iSuppli provides in-depth analysis of the recent EU ITS legislation.

In early July, the EU Parliament along with the EU Council agreed on passing an ITS Directive. As a previous article on GPS Business News pointed out, eCall was specifically mentioned in the ITS Directive. In fact, it was one of the main points of the legislation. However, it is important to note in EU terminology that this was passed as a “directive,” and not as a “mandate.”

iSuppli sources within the EU Parliament revealed that the only way the ITS Directive was able to make it through the votes needed for passage was for compromises that brought on board the UK votes as well as the French votes. These were two main voting blocs that originally opposed a pan-European mandated eCall.

Also, the EU Council already flatly rejected the idea of mandatory pan-European eCall during the First Reading. The Parliament and the Council did reach an agreement, but in doing so they also changed the original implementation of eCall, including some key aspects. One could even question whether this is really eCall that is being adopted or something entirely different because of the changes.

Is This Really Still eCall?
As mentioned above the key term to latch onto here is “Directive.” In order for the Parliament to win over the UK vote, they had to give up the dream of a pan-European eCall mandated system.

iSuppli learned from a Member of Parliament who is also on the Transportation Committee that the UK along with a few other countries (Czech Republic, Malta, Poland and Portugal) agreed to an amendment that leaves the decision to implement eCall up to the State. This is the definition within the EU community. A mandate is forced on the States, while a Directive is up to the States to decide whether or not to implement it.

In 2012, a committee will decide on the timeline of deployment, but again the decision is up to the States or countries. This means, however, that the OEMs must be prepared because if one European country decides to implement the directive, the OEMs would have to abide by the decision. Since most OEMs do not make separate cars for each country, they would most likely have to begin implementing Telematics Control Units in all cars, not just those sold in the country of implementation.

It is also important to note that this Directive states that if a State agrees to implement it, the State must follow the standards set forth by the European Commission.

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