This system is quality management system standard in the automobile field applied to automobile parts, and this standard was developed by IATF consisting of the world-class car manufacturing businesses, such as GM and FORD, etc. for the purpose of continual improvement of an organization related to automobile parts, prevention of non-conformity, and reduction in distribution and waste. ISO/TS 16949 includes additional system requirements by automobile business circles on the basis of ISO 9001(quality management system).

In the late 1990s, automobile mother companies and suppliers have strongly demanded the necessity of unifying diverse Quality management system requirements(the US QS-9000, VDA6.1 in Germany, EAQA in France and AVSQ in Italy, etc), which have been applied to them, into the internationally used unitary quality management system requirements.

In 1997, International Automotive Task Force(IATF) and ISO/TC 176 composed a new ISO/TS Task Group for inquiring into standardization plan for automotive business circles quality system requirement in response to such a demand. This Task Group’s achievements are the very ISO/TS18949 and at present, ISO/TS 16949:2009 is applied.