Update to Access Point provider identification on peppol-id.eu

We have changed how we identify Access Point providers in the Peppol Access Point Market Share statistics. The new approach allows us to determine more accurately which provider each Peppol participant uses to receive documents. Below, we explain the methodology and its impact on the displayed data.

Each participant receives documents through an Access Point, i.e. a provider that handles its communication within the Peppol network. The identity of this provider is included in the Access Point's digital certificate. The certificate contains the organisation name and the Peppol Seat ID, which identifies the provider within the Peppol network.

We now identify the provider primarily from the Access Point certificate rather than from the domain of the server or platform on which the service is hosted.

Why we use the certificate

Multiple providers may use the same shared infrastructure or platform. A single technical infrastructure can therefore serve several independent providers.

The identity contained in the certificate allows us to assign each participant to its actual Access Point provider rather than to the operator of the platform or infrastructure on which the service is running.

Impact on the data

Participants are now assigned to providers in a way that more accurately reflects the actual Access Point through which they receive documents.

As a result, the ranking has changed and the market distribution is now more granular. Some of the larger market shares that were previously attributed to a single infrastructure operator actually belonged to several independent providers using the same platform.

How we recalculated the data

We had stored the Peppol Seat ID throughout the entire period. For each unique Seat ID, we retrieved the provider's organisation name from the certificate, created a Seat ID → provider mapping, and used it to update the existing assignments.

This meant that we did not need to retrieve all of the original network data again or estimate provider identities. We also cross-checked the names against the public list of certified service providers published by OpenPeppol.

How we display the data

The ranking is based on the actual Access Point, identified primarily by the identity contained in its certificate.

We have updated the methodology page to reflect this approach.

Data from August 2026 onwards is based on direct measurements. Earlier months are estimated because historical participant migrations between providers cannot be reliably reconstructed retrospectively. This boundary is also indicated in the charts.

Going forward

We associate the provider identity with the Peppol Seat ID contained in the certificate. Regular automated checks will alert us to newly emerging significant providers and to cases where infrastructure is shared between multiple providers.

We also re-check participants approximately once a week so that changes of Access Point and migrations to another provider can be detected as quickly as possible.

Acknowledgement

The initial feedback that prompted this review came from the community. Michael Walther from The Invoicing Hub pointed out that some of our assignments reflected the server or platform on which the service was running rather than the Access Point actually serving the participant. He also noted that several records had become outdated after participants moved to another provider.

This led us to review the entire methodology from end to end and to move to an approach that identifies the provider primarily from the identity contained in the Access Point certificate.