The Machinery Regulation modernises EU product-safety law to reflect digitalisation, connectivity, and artificial intelligence. Replacing the 2006 Machinery Directive, it sets harmonised requirements for the design, construction, and placing on the market of machinery and related products, ensuring human safety and legal consistency across the Union. Crucially, it acknowledges emerging AI technologies by referring to machinery “with intended fully or partially self-evolving behaviour or logic that is designed to operate with varying levels of autonomy” (Annex III, Part B, 1.1.6), requiring that control systems be designed and constructed to prevent unsafe or unintended actions. The Regulation also requires manufacturers to identify risks “that might arise during the product’s lifecycle due to an intended evolution of its behaviour” (Annex III, Part B, 1.2.1). By incorporating these adaptive-system safeguards, the Regulation links machinery safety with the EU’s wider digital governance framework, complementing the AI Act, Cyber Resilience Act, and Product Liability Directive.
Full name: Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 June 2023 on machinery and repealing Directive 2006/42/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council and Council Directive 73/361/EEC (Text with EEA relevance).