Ismaning, Germany. October 12, 2026.
CARUSO GmbH today published the report on its 5th edition of the Connected Vehicle Field Test (CVFT). The CVFT report delivers insights based on a systematic evaluation of how vehicle manufacturers are implementing the EU Data Act. The EU Data Act became applicable on September 12, 2025, as a horizontal regulation to foster the use of machine generated data in mobile devices. This also includes data generated in vehicles while driving. The Data Act gives users the right to share their data with any party of their choice and puts obligations on data holders such as vehicle manufacturers to grant access to such data. The CVFT was supported by ten leading European industry associations and their members.
The EU Data Act represents a fundamental shift in the connected vehicle ecosystem, granting vehicle owners for the first time legal rights to access their car’s data and to share it with third-party service providers.
“The EU Data Act has the potential to become a game changer for the mobility sector if, and only if, all vehicle manufacturers comply with the EU Data Act by commercially and technically adequate means,” said Jens Knodel, Director Platform at CARUSO Dataplace. “However, our evaluation showed that there are still major gaps to be closed before third-party service providers can scale their use cases. So, even one year after the Data Act became applicable, there is not yet an attractive business environment for multi-brand services based on connected car data. Our CVFT 5.0 report provides critical insights on how vehicle manufacturers are responding to the Data Act obligations.”
From September 2025 to July 2026, CARUSO systematically evaluated the EU Data Act solutions of all major vehicle manufacturers. The key findings are as follows:
- Highly heterogeneous Data Act implementation by the vehicle manufacturers
While some vehicle manufacturers implemented measures to comply with the EU Data Act already in September 2025, others followed a few months later, and some vehicle manufacturers still do not offer solutions for drivers to share their data.
- Third-party service providers require a common data set to be made available across all vehicle manufacturers.
The EU Commission has provided explicit guidance on the type of data which shall be made available to consumers for sharing. The CVFT compared the different data offerings and found substantial differences among vehicle manufacturers in the available data points. A common set of data items across vehicle manufacturers is the foundation for any multi-brand use case. Without a common data set, the use cases cannot be rolled out multi-brand across all vehicle manufacturers. - End users often struggle with processes to enable data sharing with third parties
CARUSO collected feedback from end users interacting with apps, portals, forms, and even emails with the different vehicle manufacturers. The most common feedback was that it is often neither simple nor intuitive for non-digital natives to grant access to vehicle data for third parties. Business cases based on vehicle data will fail to scale due to significant drop-off in user conversion. - Heterogeneous ways of provisioning data and differences in data quality
Scalable and automated use cases require state-of-the-practice concepts and technologies for data sharing with third parties. This includes modern streaming technologies and/or Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) instead of web forms, email or downloadable files as still offered by a significant number of vehicle manufacturers. - Significant differences in data packaging and pricing models for third parties
Implementations of the EU Data Act come with a diverse range of pricing models and prices when third parties want to access vehicle data. The pricing for all data available ranges from 0.00 EUR to more than 30.00 EUR per vehicle per month. Some vehicle manufacturers allow third parties to pick and choose the data items, while others offer only predefined packages (or bundles) of data items limiting the possibilities of choice.
The CVFT report is available free of charge to interested parties. For more information, visit the Connected Vehicle Field Test 5.0 page at https://www.caruso-dataplace.com/cvft5_information/
The support from members of ten leading European associations from the automotive and mobility sectors underlines the industry-wide significance of the EU Data Act and the need for transparency and consistency in its implementation. In particular, CARUSO is very grateful for the support of the following organizations: Automotive Data Publishers Association (ADPA), Association Internationale des Réparateurs en Carrosserie (AIRC), Automotive Mobility Europe (AME), European Association of Automotive Suppliers (CLEPA), European Garage Equipment Association (EGEA), Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile, Europe, the Middle East and Africa (FIA Region I), International Federation of Automotive Aftermarket Distributors (FIGIEFA), European insurance and reinsurance federation (Insurance Europe), European federation of leasing company associations (Leaseurope), and European Tyre & Rubber Manufacturers’ Association (Tyres Europe).