- Legal name
- TÜV Rheinland AG
- Single shareholder
- TÜV Rheinland Berlin Brandenburg Pfalz e.V.A registered association. The group operates through a large number of subsidiaries.
- Founded
- 1872
- Headquarters
- Cologne, Germany
- Capability layer
- Compliance and documentation
- Service areas
- Testing · Inspection · Certification · Training
- Relevance to charging products
- Conformity assessment and market-access testing for electrical productsThe alliance is not affiliated with this organisation and performs no testing.
- Website
- tuv.com
- Directory status
- Listed company — compiled from public information. Not a member.
What the company does
TÜV Rheinland is a testing, inspection and certification organisation. It was founded in 1872 and is headquartered in Cologne, Germany. The operating holding company is TÜV Rheinland AG, whose single shareholder is TÜV Rheinland Berlin Brandenburg Pfalz e.V., a registered association; the group operates through a large number of subsidiaries.
For charging products, this is the kind of organisation that carries out conformity assessment — the testing that produces the evidence a manufacturer needs for CE marking, for a national certification scheme, or for a retailer's own supplier requirements.
Where it sits in the chain
Compliance and documentation is the last layer of the industry map. It does not change the product. It determines whether the product may legally be sold in a given market, and what evidence the seller must be able to produce if a customs authority, a market surveillance body or a retailer asks.
The layer is unusual in the chain because the work is commissioned by the company that wants the certificate, while the authority belongs to the body that issues it. Those are two different parties with two different interests, which is the reason the distinction between them is worth keeping straight.
What to check when sourcing at this layer
A test report is not a certificate. They are different documents with different weight. A report records what was tested and what the results were. A certificate is issued under a specific scheme by a body accredited for that scheme. Retailers and customs authorities ask for specific documents, and producing the wrong one delays a shipment even when the product is genuinely compliant.
Scope matters more than the logo. A certificate covers a defined product, in a defined configuration, assessed against a defined standard, and it carries a validity condition. A certificate for one model does not extend to a variant with a different cell, a different power stage or a different enclosure.
Check the issuing body's own record. Certification bodies publish searchable databases. A certificate number can be checked against the issuer's own record in a few minutes, and that check is worth considerably more than any document a supplier forwards.
Reading a test report and Conformance, certification and market access cover the detail.
Note on this entry
This entry was compiled by the alliance from the public sources listed below. It was not supplied, reviewed or approved by the company. TÜV Rheinland is not a member of the alliance, and listing is not an endorsement, a recommendation or an approval of any product.
The alliance is not affiliated with TÜV Rheinland, does not perform testing, and does not issue certification or any product mark. This entry describes what an organisation of this type does in the supply chain; it is not a recommendation of this company over any other body carrying out the same work.
Sources
This entry was compiled by the alliance from the public sources listed below. It was not supplied, reviewed or approved by the company.
- TÜV Rheinland — corporate site, stating the 1872 founding and the Cologne headquarters (accessed October 2026)
- TÜV Rheinland — group structure, identifying TÜV Rheinland AG as the operating holding company with TÜV Rheinland Berlin Brandenburg Pfalz e.V. as its single shareholder (accessed October 2026)