Requirements of external and internal customers towards the quality of steel products are continuously rising. To fulfill these requirements, production processes are becoming more complex and need more information about the individual product. This is especially true for production networks where different companies work together on a single product.
The goal of this paper is to propose a first definition of the term "state of a product" as a combination of different relevant state characteristics of a product at a specific point during the production process. The idea is that the state ideally provides all necessary information to all stakeholders at any time before, during and after the industrial production process. Additionally, the question of which state characteristics are relevant defining product state and how they can be identified will be examined. Subsequently, an industrial example will show how the product state of a highly stressed steel product can be described during the production step of machining by a selection of relevant state characteristics. Concluding, an outlook on further research and chances of an information management based on a state oriented view on products will be presented.