EDIFACT in Spanish automotive

Spain is Europe’s 2nd largest car manufacturer after Germany, with nearly 2 million vehicles per year. SEAT (Martorell), Stellantis (Vigo, Madrid), Ford (Almussafes), Renault (Valladolid, Palencia) and Mercedes-Benz (Vitoria) plants, together with their tier-1 suppliers — Gestamp ahead — exchange daily millions of EDIFACT messages structured by the SEMI/AENOR, Galia, Odette and VDA standards, transported over OFTP2 through the private ENX network.

Plants and their volume

The Spanish production map concentrates 9 main plants and two types of tier-1 suppliers: local subsidiaries of pan-European groups (Magna Steyr, Lear, Faurecia, Forvia) and Spanish majors that have themselves become global (Gestamp, Antolin, Ficosa).

# Main Spanish automotive manufacturers (2024)

SEAT (Volkswagen group)              ~500,000 vehicles/year
  - Main plant: Martorell (Barcelona) — SEAT/Cupra Leon, Ibiza, Arona, Audi A1, Audi Q3
  - R&D hub: Centro Tecnico Martorell (CTM)
  - EDI standards: VDA + Odette + SEMI/AENOR
  - Transport: OFTP2 over ENX
  - Key tier-1s: Gestamp, Antolin, Ficosa, Lear, Magna

Stellantis Vigo (PSA + FCA)          ~480,000 vehicles/year
  - Main plant: Vigo (Galicia) — Peugeot 2008/308, Citroen Berlingo/C4
  - EDI standards: Galia + Odette + SEMI/AENOR
  - Transport: OFTP2 over ENX, AS2 secondary

Stellantis Madrid (Villaverde)       ~80,000 vehicles/year
  - Main plant: Villaverde — Citroen C4, Peugeot 308 SW
  - EDI standards: Galia + Odette
  - Transport: OFTP2 over ENX

Ford Almussafes (Valencia)           ~280,000 vehicles/year
  - Models: Kuga, Transit Connect (planned for electric models 2026+)
  - EDI standards: Odette + JIS/MMOG-LE Ford US
  - Transport: OFTP2 over ENX + AS2 spot

Renault Valladolid                   ~150,000 vehicles/year
  - Models: Captur, Twizy (electric microvehicle)
  - EDI standards: Galia + Odette
  - Transport: OFTP2 over ENX

Renault Palencia                     ~80,000 vehicles/year
  - Models: Megane, Kadjar (later E-Tech successors)
  - EDI standards: Galia + Odette

Mercedes-Benz Vitoria-Gasteiz        ~165,000 vehicles/year
  - Models: Vito, V-Class (VAN-X). Electric conversion 2026
  - EDI standards: VDA + Odette
  - Transport: OFTP2 over ENX

Nissan Barcelona (historical)        Closed January 2021
  - Reconverted into batteries/hydrogen hub by Mercedes / SAGA consortium

Iveco Madrid                         ~75,000 commercial vehicles/year
  - Models: Daily (LCVs), Iveco Stralis (heavy-duty tractors)
  - EDI standards: Odette + ISO-CAR (internal to CNH Industrial)

CNH (Plasencia)                      ~25,000 agricultural tractors/year
  - Models: New Holland, Case IH
  - EDI standards: Odette + ANSI X12 (US heritage)

Gestamp Automocion                   Global tier-1, Spain HQ
  - 109 plants in 24 countries, ~25 of them in Spain
  - Supplier to SEAT, Stellantis, Ford, Renault, VW, Daimler
  - EDI standards: Galia + VDA + Odette + ANSI X12 + Catia-V5 CAD

SEMI / AENOR: the Spanish sectoral standard

AENOR (Asociacion Espanola de Normalizacion y Certificacion, the Spanish standards body) has maintained the SEMI (Standard Espanol de Mensajes de Intercambio) standard for the automotive sector since 1996. SEMI is a complete EDIFACT D.96A subset with national extensions for:

• Spanish tax identification — NIF / CIF in NAD segments, Recargo de Equivalencia handling.
• Iberian customs codes — TARIC, Madrid-Barajas and Algeciras codes for international flows.
• Proprietary technical vocabulary — part types (carroceria, motor, transmision, chasis, embellecedores), metric and traditional Castilian units (kilo, kg).

SEMI coexists with group standards (Galia for Stellantis/Renault, VDA for VW/Mercedes) depending on the final customer. In practice, a Spanish tier-1 working with several OEMs must master at least SEMI + Galia + VDA + Odette.

Articulation with Galia, Odette and VDA

The European automotive standards landscape derives from four historical organisations, each present in Spain through OEM subsidiaries:

• Galia — Franco-Italian standard (historically PSA and FIAT, today Stellantis + Renault Group). Dominant at Vigo, Madrid Stellantis, Valladolid, Palencia. Specifications at galia.fr.
• VDA — Verband der Automobilindustrie (Germany). Volkswagen and Daimler group standard. Dominant at Martorell SEAT and Vitoria Mercedes. Specifications at vda.de.
• Odette International — pan-European federation that harmonises Galia + VDA + AECOC + ASSORTI recommendations. Publishes the Odette Logistic Recommendations (RLO) which gradually replace national standards.
• SEMI/AENOR — domestic, gradually fading against Odette but kept for local flows.

By 2026, Odette has become the default standard for new contracts. SEMI persists for legacy contracts and certain Spain-specific tier-2 / tier-3 suppliers.

Daily messages

The key messages used in Spanish automotive, in operational chronological order:

DELFOR and DELJIT: scheduling

The core of automotive EDI lies in two messages: DELFOR (forecast schedule) and DELJIT (JIT call). Example of a weekly DELFOR sent by SEAT Martorell to Gestamp for Leon body parts:

UNB+UNOC:3+8499999900001:14+8412345600007:14+260415:0700+SEAT042'
UNH+1+DELFOR:D:96A:UN:EAN006'
BGM+243+DELFOR-SEAT-W16-2026+9'
DTM+137:20260415:102'
DTM+157:20260420:102'
RFF+ON:CT-2024-SEAT-PB14501'
NAD+BY+8499999900001::9'
NAD+SU+8412345600007::9'
NAD+CN+8499999900015::9'
LIN+1++8410987654321:EN'
PIA+1+PA-VOLANT-LEON-2026:VP'
QTY+1:1200'
DTM+11:20260420:102'
QTY+1:1200'
DTM+11:20260427:102'
QTY+1:1500'
DTM+11:20260504:102'
QTY+1:1500'
DTM+11:20260511:102'
LIN+2++8410987654338:EN'
PIA+1+PA-PALIER-LEON-2026:VP'
QTY+1:2400'
DTM+11:20260420:102'
QTY+1:2400'
DTM+11:20260427:102'
UNS+S'
CNT+2:2'
UNT+24+1'
UNZ+1+SEAT042'

And its DELJIT counterpart, sent on the actual delivery day to call the exact hourly quantity:

UNB+UNOC:3+8499999900001:14+8412345600007:14+260418:0900+JIT0001'
UNH+1+DELJIT:D:96A:UN:EAN005'
BGM+251+JIT-SEAT-MT-2026-04-18+9'
DTM+137:20260418:102'
RFF+ON:DELFOR-SEAT-W16-2026'
NAD+BY+8499999900001::9'
NAD+SU+8412345600007::9'
NAD+CN+8499999900015::9'
SEQ++1'
LIN+1++8410987654321:EN'
QTY+1:120'
DTM+11:202604180830:203'
SEQ++2'
LIN+2++8410987654321:EN'
QTY+1:120'
DTM+11:202604181000:203'
SEQ++3'
LIN+3++8410987654321:EN'
QTY+1:120'
DTM+11:202604181400:203'
UNS+S'
CNT+2:3'
UNT+18+1'
UNZ+1+JIT0001'

• DELFOR — tells Gestamp the weekly volumes over 4 weeks (1200 + 1200 + 1500 + 1500 parts). Lets Gestamp plan production and upstream supplies.
• DELJIT — on D-day, triggers the 3 JIT deliveries at 08:30, 10:00 and 14:00, i.e. 360 parts delivered in 3 batches of 120, synchronised with the SEAT assembly line.
• Tolerance — a DELFOR + 1 week remains flexible (+/- 30%), a DELFOR + 4 days is firm (+/- 5%), a DELJIT is strict (+/- 0%, unless manual renegotiation).

OFTP2 over ENX: the transport channel

The transport standard is OFTP2 (Odette File Transfer Protocol version 2.0, RFC 5024) over the private ENX network (European Network Exchange). Features:

• ENX — multi-proxy private VPN interconnecting European OEMs and tier-1s. Guaranteed latency < 50 ms, 99.99% availability, ISO 27001 certification.
• OFTP2 vs OFTP1 — OFTP1 (RFC 2204) ran over X.25, OFTP2 runs over TCP/IP with mandatory TLS 1.2/1.3, mutual certificate authentication, AES-256-GCM encryption, DEFLATE compression, restart on disconnect, negotiable acknowledgement.
• Coexistence with AS2 — some tier-1s (Gestamp in particular) deploy AS2 (RFC 4130) as an alternative channel, notably for exchanges with Japanese OEMs (Toyota, Nissan) that do not use ENX.

Gestamp and the Spanish tier-1s

Three Spanish tier-1 suppliers have become global players and impose their own EDI architecture on their tier-2 and tier-3 subcontractors:

• Gestamp Automocion — Madrid HQ, 109 plants in 24 countries, ~EUR 9 bn revenue. Specialist in hot-stamped body structures. Supplies SEAT, Stellantis, Ford, Renault, VW, Daimler, BMW, GM, Ford US, Honda US. EDI standards mastered: Galia, VDA, Odette, ANSI X12 (for US), JIS (for Honda/Toyota).
• Grupo Antolin — Burgos HQ, ~EUR 4.5 bn revenue. Specialist in interiors (headliner, doors, lighting). Supplies all European and US OEMs.
• Ficosa International — Viladecavalls HQ (Barcelona), ~EUR 1.5 bn revenue. Specialist in mirrors, cameras, electronics. Supplies Stellantis, Renault, VW.

These three groups often impose their own Odette subset on their subcontractors (e.g. "Gestamp EDI Standard" GES-EDI-2024), which extends Odette with fields specific to hot stamping or structural aluminium.

Sources

• ANFAC — Memoria Anual 2024, market shares and production capacity
• SERNAUTO — Spanish Association of Automotive Component Manufacturers
• AENOR — UNE-EN 9300 and SEMI/AENOR standard maintenance
• Odette International — Odette Logistic Recommendations (RLO) 2024
• Galia — Galia standard recommendations 2024 (PSA/Renault)
• VDA — Verband der Automobilindustrie standards 4905, 4994, 4998
• ENX Association — 2024 member directory and certifications
• Annual reports of Gestamp (NYSE: GES), Grupo Antolin, Ficosa

Cross-links

• Spain hub — full e-invoicing mandate overview
• Spain retail EDIFACT — the other major Spanish EDI sub-sector
• Facturae — commercial invoice format
• France — automotive EDIFACT (comparator)
• EDIFACT — message directory
• OFTP2 Decoder — diagnostic tool
• ANFAC — official site
• Odette International
• ENX Association