European digital infrastructure for trusted business interactions
The European Business Wallet is a proposed European digital infrastructure for trusted business interactions. It is designed to help companies, self-employed professionals, public sector bodies and other organisations identify themselves digitally, manage authorisations, exchange trusted data and communicate securely across borders.
Read the official proposal here.
Where the European Digital Identity Wallet mainly focuses on individuals, the European Business Wallet focuses on organisations and economic activity. It can be seen as a specialised, regulated form of an Organizational Wallet, developed specifically for the European internal market.
The Business Wallet is therefore more than a digital folder for company documents. It is intended to become a trust layer for digital business processes in Europe.
Why is a European Business Wallet needed?
Many business processes in Europe are still fragmented. Organisations often need to identify themselves repeatedly, submit the same information multiple times, or prove representation rights through manual checks. This creates delays, administrative burden and unnecessary costs, especially in cross-border procedures.The European Business Wallet aims to reduce this friction by enabling organisations to reuse trusted data. Instead of relying on PDF uploads, manual verification or separate national portals, organisations should be able to present verifiable information from recognised sources.
This fits within a broader European direction: digital identity, eIDAS and the European Digital Identity Regulation, the Once-Only Technical System, business registers and trust services are increasingly being connected into a common digital framework.
Who can use it?
The proposal applies broadly to economic operators. This includes companies, partnerships, associations, foundations, self-employed professionals, sole traders and other entities conducting economic activity.Public sector bodies can also own or use European Business Wallets. This is important because the wallet is not only intended for business-to-government interactions, but also for secure communication and data exchange between public authorities and, over time, between businesses themselves.
What can a European Business Wallet do?
The proposed wallet includes a set of core minimum functionalities. These include digital identification, authentication, signing, sealing, submitting documents, receiving official notifications and exchanging trusted data.A wallet must be able to receive, store, combine and present Electronic Attestations of Attributes. These are digital statements about attributes of an organisation or person, such as registration data, permits, authorisations, certificates or other official information.
The wallet must also support Selective Disclosure. This means that an organisation should be able to share only the information needed for a specific transaction, instead of disclosing a full document or complete data set.
In addition, the wallet supports legally relevant trust services, including the Qualified Electronic Signature, the Qualified Electronic Seal and qualified time stamping. These services make it possible to sign, seal and timestamp documents in a way that can have legal effect under EU law.
Managing mandates and representation rights
A central function of the Business Wallet is the ability to manage who may act on behalf of an organisation.In practice, this means that an organisation can give specific users access to the wallet and define which actions they are allowed to perform. For example, an employee may be allowed to submit a report, a director may be allowed to sign an agreement, or an external representative may be authorised for a specific procedure.
This is closely related to the concepts of Mandate, Representation rights and Power of Attorney. In the Business Wallet context, these authorisations need to be technically manageable, verifiable and revocable.
Legally valid communication through QERDS
One of the most important elements of the proposal is the role of the Qualified Electronic Registered Delivery Service, often abbreviated as QERDS.QERDS is a qualified trust service under eIDAS that enables data to be transmitted electronically with legal evidence of sending, receiving and integrity. In simple terms, it can function as a form of legally reliable digital registered delivery.
The European Business Wallet must support this secure communication channel. This could make it possible for organisations and public authorities to exchange formal documents, notifications and reports digitally, while retaining evidence of who sent what, when it was sent and whether the content remained unchanged.
For self-employed professionals and sole traders, the proposal also foresees access to this secure communication channel through their personal European Digital Identity Wallet, without necessarily requiring a separate full business identity.
Legal equivalence
The proposal introduces the principle of Legal equivalence. This means that certain actions performed through the European Business Wallet can have the same legal effect as equivalent actions performed in person, on paper or through another legally accepted process.This principle is important, but it is not unlimited. Existing legal, administrative and procedural requirements continue to apply. A wallet does not automatically replace every formal step in every procedure. Instead, it provides a trusted digital means to perform specific actions, such as identification, authentication, signing, sealing, document submission and formal notification.
Business identity from trusted sources
The European Business Wallet depends on reliable organisational identity data. This identity data should be based on Authentic Sources, such as business registers or other official registers.For companies and other legal entities, the proposal refers to the European Unique Identifier, or EUID, where available. The EUID is already used in the Business Registers Interconnection System, which connects national business registers across the EU.
The proposal also introduces European Business Wallet Owner Identification Data. This is the identity data used to verify the organisation that owns a Business Wallet.
The European Digital Directory
A wallet ecosystem only works if organisations and public authorities can find and verify each other. For that reason, the proposal introduces a European Digital Directory.This directory should contain trusted information about economic operators and public sector bodies participating in the Business Wallet ecosystem. It may include identifiers, digital addresses and other data needed to contact or verify an organisation.
This is an important building block for machine-readable trust discovery. In future digital processes, business software, public sector systems and AI agents may need to automatically determine whether they are interacting with the right organisation, using the right endpoint and relying on the right source of information.
Interoperability and portability
The European Business Wallet is intended to function across borders and across providers. This makes interoperability essential.Different wallet providers should be able to support the same core functions and interact with relying parties, public authorities and other wallets. The wallet framework also needs to connect with existing digital identity and trust infrastructure, including EUDI Wallets, trust services, business registers and public sector systems.
The proposal also includes data portability. Organisations should be able to export relevant wallet data, such as identification data, attestations, communication history and transaction records, and move to another provider. This is intended to reduce vendor lock-in and support a competitive market.
Supervision of wallet providers
Providing a European Business Wallet will be a regulated activity. Wallet providers will need to be authorised and supervised. They must meet requirements relating to security, reliability, continuity, risk management and data protection.A Qualified Trust Service Provider may play an important role in this ecosystem, especially when issuing qualified attestations or providing qualified trust services. However, becoming a Business Wallet provider will require more than offering ordinary software. Providers will need to comply with a dedicated regulatory framework and will be listed publicly once authorised.
Is use mandatory for businesses?
The proposal does not immediately require all businesses to use a European Business Wallet. The main obligation is on the acceptance side: public sector bodies will need to enable the use of the wallet for relevant administrative procedures and reporting obligations.This means adoption will depend on practical value. Businesses will use the wallet if it helps them reduce administrative burden, access services more easily, prove authorisations, exchange documents securely or operate more efficiently across borders.
The European Business Wallet proposal is now entering a decisive phase of the legislative process. Following the Council’s negotiating position in June 2026, the European Parliament’s Committee on Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE) adopted its report on 10 September 2026 and decided to open interinstitutional negotiations. This brings the European Business Wallet another step closer to a final regulatory framework, although the final requirements may still change during negotiations between the Parliament, Council and Commission.
For organisations and public authorities, the focus is therefore increasingly shifting from understanding the proposal to preparing for implementation: trusted organisational identity, representation and mandates, electronic attestations, qualified trust services and interoperable cross-border business processes will need to work together in practice.
Relevance for AI agents and automated business processes
The European Business Wallet is not only relevant for human users. The proposal also anticipates future use cases involving automated systems, digital assets and agentic AI.This matters because more business interactions will be handled by software, platforms and AI agents. These systems will need to know which organisation they are dealing with, whether a person or agent is authorised to act, and whether the data being exchanged can be trusted.
In this context, the Business Wallet can become a trust layer for automated digital transactions. It can help systems verify identity, mandates, credentials and communication channels before acting on behalf of an organisation.
Why this matters
The European Business Wallet could become a foundational component for digital business in Europe. It combines trusted organisational identity, verifiable data, mandate management, legally valid communication and cross-border interoperability.For public authorities, it can help simplify administrative procedures and reduce repeated information requests. For businesses, it can reduce manual checks, duplicated submissions and cross-border friction. For technology providers, it creates a new market for wallets, credentials, trust services, directories, integrations and sector-specific applications.
The actual impact will depend on implementation. Many technical specifications and implementing acts still need to be developed. Adoption will also depend on whether public authorities, registers, wallet providers, trust service providers and relying parties can connect in practice.
The role of FIDES
For the FIDES Community, the European Business Wallet is an important development. It connects directly to themes such as interoperability, reusable verifiable data, discoverable credential types, trusted organisational identity and practical collaboration between public and private parties.A successful Business Wallet ecosystem requires more than regulation. It requires shared profiles, testable implementations, reusable credentials, clear governance and practical use cases.
FIDES aims to contribute to this practical translation. By bringing together public organisations, private sector participants, technology providers and relying parties, FIDES helps explore how the European Business Wallet can become a trusted and interoperable infrastructure for doing business in Europe.