The global automobile industry is projected to reach USD 7822.1 billion by 2035, growing at a CAGR of 5.6% during 2025-2035. The global automobile industry is a behemoth, projected to be at $4.8 trillion in 2026. In such a large industry, encountering major roadblocks and challenges is common. Many times, the factors aren’t in the control of car manufacturers. These include the semiconductor shortage, quickly evolving consumer preferences, and even the introduction of EV and non-internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles. All these roadblocks require car manufacturers to diversify their product offerings, which also means creating and managing extensive spare part catalogs for aftermarket operations.

From providing quality services to handling replacements, the aftermarket covers so many areas. A single error in part identification and ordering can lead to huge logistics costs to the OEM, increase equipment downtime, and customer frustrations. To avoid any such unforeseen circumstances, car manufacturers must modernize their parts cataloging system.

In this blog, we have covered the primary reasons for adopting digital transformation and also the best approaches to modernize your spare parts cataloging system in 2026.

Key Spare Parts Catalog Management Challenges that Car Manufacturers Face

Although the aftermarket is gradually adopting digital, not all solutions are created equal. Car manufacturers are still facing the following car parts catalog management challenges in the aftermarket.

1. Maintenance and Distribution of Catalogs

While creating and distributing spare parts catalogs through online PDFs is easy, sharing real-time updates, such as price changes, corrections, new feature updates, or discounted parts, is difficult. The problem aggravates when dealing with larger dealer networks. Many car manufacturers have production in one country, but their supply chain operations are expanding globally. For such manufacturers, managing geo-specific pricing and part availability becomes more difficult.

2. Part Misidentification and Misordering

Complex catalogs make it difficult to find the right spare part for a car. Many factors, such as the generation of the car, model, and variant, the availability of parts, and scarcity, also contribute to this problem. After part misidentification, the next problem that dealers face is misordering. A wrong order means losses in terms of logistics and reverse logistics costs. It can also lead to non-compliance issues if installed, or in the worst-case scenario, a mishap, dragging the car manufacturers into legal troubles.

3. Finding Part Applicability

A car parts catalog can include thousands of parts, with many of the parts being revised regularly. Some parts are removed from the catalog, and some are added. This creates an applicability problem for the technicians. A single spare part can actually be utilized in multiple vehicles. When service technicians have poor information about part applicability, finding the right part can take time and lead to misidentification or increased repair times. 

4. Ensuring Serviceability Across all Regions

The primary focus of the aftermarket operation is ensuring that all the regions a car manufacturer operates in are easily serviceable. Spare part catalogs play an important role in this. Many times, not just the spare parts but the vehicles available across geographies differ significantly. This leads to the creation of thousands of SKUs in the catalog, with different Bill of Materials (BOMs) for different regions. Your spare part catalog should be capable of displaying the right part as per the BOM of that particular region. 

5. Managing Supersession and Obsolete Information

Due to value engineering, OEMs are often introducing new features in their cars. This is done to meet the changing consumer demands, integrate new technologies, meet statutory compliance, and gain a competitive edge. However, with value engineering comes the problem of part supersession. Car manufacturers need to ensure that obsolete information is removed from all the catalogs. In case the information is important and might help technicians in servicing an old model, the version history option should be provided in the solution. 

6. Limited Hands-on Information

At a dealership level, only a few technicians have complete information about the OEM’s spare parts catalog. However, the workforce is rotational. In the absence of that one technician, after-sales service may witness a slump. Thus, OEMs also need to focus on ensuring that their dealers don’t remain over-reliant on limited personnel. While this can be handled with training and product knowledge sessions, this approach can be highly costly and time-consuming. It may also interrupt existing business operations. 

How Modern Spare Part Catalog Systems Can Help?

The aforementioned challenges exist in legacy solutions as well. With their outdated interface, dealers still need to cross-verify every detail. While manual lookup is possible in such car parts catalog software, the entire process can be lengthy and tedious. Thus, car manufacturers need to modernize their entire parts cataloging system.

1. Bring AI Automation

Since the emergence of AI, global industries have started utilizing it to reduce operational costs and manual errors. With the help of AI-powered car parts catalog software, OEMs can bring true automation to their operations. They can speed up everyday processes, make the catalog more interactive, and even collect data to predict inventory stock levels.

2. Increase Productivity

Automation and digital transformation also mean dealers don’t have to repeat mundane tasks. They can browse the entire catalog faster, identify parts, and place correct orders. Meanwhile, as manual data entry is eliminated from the process, the chances of errors are reduced in the process. Dealers are able to cater to more customers and provide faster service. Thus, increasing productivity and reducing the overall operational costs.

3. Cater to Broad Requirements

The functionalities of legacy car parts cataloging solutions are quite limited. Dealers can only find parts and see related information in such systems. However, modern car parts catalog software solutions are the opposite. They cater to broader requirements. With their help, dealers can browse parts, place orders, communicate with OEMs, and OEMs can even see dealer inventory stock levels. Moreover, these solutions can be integrated with other modern business tools.

4. Help in Expanding Aftermarket Operations

Traditional car parts cataloging systems aren’t scalable. They cannot help you expand and manage aftermarket operations across multiple geographies and regions. For this purpose, the software should support part cataloging as per Bill of Materials (BOMs), which vary across different regions. Likewise, when expanding aftermarket operations, OEMs need a multi-lingual parts cataloging system that can simplify the onboarding experience for dealers. Only modern solutions are developed to fulfill these requirements. 

Car Parts Catalog Management with Intelli Catalog

Intelli Catalog is a next-gen AI-powered electronic parts catalog software. It is developed after considering the daily use cases of spare parts operations and the problems that OEMs face in spare part management. With artificial intelligence and purpose-built features, it can help car manufacturers automate entire operations, remove guesswork from part identification, and boost revenue with online parts ordering. 

Currently, Intelli Catalog is already helping several global car manufacturers, such as Mahindra, MG Motors, Ford, Force, Honda, and many more, manage their spare parts catalogs. Let’s discuss in a little more depth how its features can help you refine your spare parts operations.

Key Features of Intelli Catalog

1. AI Fast Search: Technicians and dealers can ask queries in their natural language to find car spare parts. Whether they have limited information about the spare part or the make and model of the car, technicians can use voice search to easily find replacement parts.‍
2. AI Visual Search: Apart from voice search, Intelli Catalog provides the option of visual search as well. With this feature, technicians can find spare parts from anywhere in the garage. They can simply point their smartphone cameras at the car, and AI will search the catalog to bring all applicable parts.
3. Multiple Search Options: With multiple search options, dealers can search for car parts easily and reduce wrong part orders. These options of Intelli Catalog include VIN/serial number, model search, part search and even figure search.
4. ‍MagicPic: OEMs can create studio-level car parts images with Intelli Catalog’s built-in MagicPic feature. Being an AI-image cleaner, MagicPic turns warehouse pictures into highly professional and stunning catalog images.\
5. ‍Order Management and Tracking Module: After finding and ordering a spare part, dealers can manage the order directly on the system with Intelli Catalog’s order management and tracking module. They can also track order delivery and return status.
6. ‍AI-Powered Demand Forecasting: Intelli Catalog can monitor real-time ordering and sales data to forecast future demand and help car manufacturers prevent understocking and overstocking problems.
7. ‍Spare Part Supersession: Car manufacturers are constantly improving their parts to provide better value to customers. Intelli Catalog lets them display part history on the catalog and easily supersede obsolete information.
8. ‍2D/3D Illustrations: Intelli Catalog also provides the best-in-the-industry part highlighting and hotspotting features. Technicians can drill down into 2D and 3D spare part illustrations to find spare parts and their VIN.
9. ‍Multi-Lingual Catalog Management: In non-English speaking countries, OEMs can deploy car parts catalog software in the native language of dealers. This helps in onboarding technicians and ensures business expansion remains fast and efficient.
10. ‍Geo-Specific Pricing: To ensure scalability in business operations, Intelli Catalog supports geo-specific pricing. Meaning, car manufacturers can define varying spare part pricing for different regions.
11. ‍Bill of Materials (BOM) Management: For cross-border spare part cataloging, Intelli Catalog also supports BOM management. Dealers will only see the spare parts that are applicable to the models and variants of their particular regions.
12. Intelli Commerce: With Intelli Commerce, OEMs can refine their spare part ordering and distribution strategy for secondary sales channels, including retailers and distributors. Retailers can browse spare parts catalogs through the mobile app and place an order.
13. ‍Dealer Inventory: OEMs can also track and see dealer inventory levels. They can review their sales figures and send timely restocking reminders.
14. ‍Part Applicability: Car spare parts have wide applicability. With Intelli Catalog, it is easy to find out all the supported makes and models for a spare part.
15. ‍Sub Admin Account Management: OEMs can streamline backend management with the help of multiple sub-admin accounts. They can assign different roles and responsibilities to the sub-admin depending on the job function.
16. ‍Native Mobile Apps: To streamline on-the-move operations, Intelli Catalog comes with Native Android and iOS mobile apps. Technicians can browse catalogs and look up spare parts from any device, anywhere.
17. ‍Online Dealer Storefronts: OEMs can sell spare parts to customers without bypassing dealers. With Intelli Catalog’s online dealer storefront features, customers can find their nearby dealers on the OEM’s official website and directly place an order.
18. Intelli GPT: For finding relevant information in the car parts catalog, technicians can use the Intelli GPT feature. They can use chat to interact with the catalog and extract all information, be it related to finding a spare part, analytics, or even understanding an assembly.

Conclusion

The car industry is growing, venturing into the future even faster than many other industries. With diverse offerings, including electric cars and modern parts that surpass the standard norms and regulations, the need for an advanced car parts catalog software is evident. When AI can help meet the rising consumer expectations, OEMs should adapt the same into their workflows. 

At the current moment, not many software solution providers are focusing on integrating AI tech into spare parts catalog solutions. Out of the few, Intelli Catalog is the one that ensures broad-level AI automation in a cost-effective manner. If interested, you can book a free personalized one-on-one demo of Intelli Catalog here.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

1. Why do car manufacturers need to modernize their digital parts catalog?

Answer: The automotive industry is getting complex. With the emergence of new technologies and rising consumer expectations, car manufacturers are working on many new features. Features that were considered modern and luxurious a few years ago, like 360-degree cameras, dashcams, ventilated seats, and sunroofs, are becoming the new norm. To cater to all these requirements and manage extensive spare parts, OEMs require modern and cutting-edge part cataloging systems.

2. How can AI help simplify spare part cataloging?

Answer: AI-enabled spare part catalog systems like Intelli Catalog provide more accuracy in cataloging operations.

• AI can help dealers in identifying the right spare parts with the help of voice search and visual search.
• It can increase overall work output and productivity while reducing operational costs.
• OEMs can also reduce operational inefficiencies that happen because of manual errors.
• By monitoring historical data, AI can help with demand forecasting and prevent spare parts understocking.

3. What is part highlighting and hotspotting?

Part highlighting and hotspotting are two impressive features of Intelli Catalog that help dealers identify replacement parts with the help of interactive 2D/3D illustrations. With part highlighting, the system can immediately highlight the required part in the 2D or 3D illustration of the assembly. Meanwhile, part hotspotting helps dealers find details, such as the VIN and part name, by interacting with the illustration. 

4. Which is the best car parts catalog software in 2026?

There are multiple solutions available in the market, but the one that truly meets the requirements of today with advanced AI capabilities is Intelli Catalog. It comes with a versatile set of features to help OEMs manage and distribute digital car part catalogs, reduce part misordering rate, and increase customer satisfaction levels. Being a multi-lingual solution, it can help OEMs manage cross-border operations as well, without the need to reinvest in another solution.