What is serialisation and why is the demand for serialisation increasing by the day?

Serialisation means every single product gets a unique ID. It finds extensive applications in the pharmaceutical industry. In Europe, it is mandatory for every pharmaceutical product to be serialised by 2019; for US markets the deadline is November 2017. And that’s for the reasons of authenticity of the products and health of the consumer. We call this ‘Internet of Packaging’ which is closely related to ‘Internet of Things’. The ability to communicate with physical elements just opens up vast range of opportunities.

 

What are the factors that drive the need for serialisation?

Anti-counterfeiting is one of drivers of serialisation. In India, we have seen counterfeiting of automobile spare parts is a massive industry; we have worked with a company in India to curb this menace with serialisation. Not only in India, the counterfeiting business is growing across the globe and there are technologies including RFID and NFCs that can actually combat this.

The other opportunity for serialisation is the overall drive towards transparency and trustworthiness with consumers. This is something we see more and more with the big brand owners, the likes of Amcor’s customers, that they want to engage with their customers to build the trust and the brand-connect. With serialised products you can create traceability; you can communicate with the consumers in ways that have never been possible before. You can reduce lead times in everything you do.

 

What brings you to Interpack?

Kezzler is one of the leaders in serialisation on a mass scale. We serialise products in really big volumes. For the last two years we have had cooperation with the packaging converter Amcor. Jointly with Amcor, we have developed a product called MaXQ. MaXQ will employ pre-serialisation to enable near-real-time data capture and strategic insights on products. Under the partnership, we (Kezzler) will generate unique dynamic QR codes and integrate them into Amcor packaging solutions. The integrated QR code will be able to communicate key datasets across supply chain nodes that have the appropriate interconnectivity.

 

Why do you call it pre-serialisation?

The idea behind MaXQ is serialising in big volumes so you pre-serialise the packaging material at the converter’s end. Amcor prints any kind of code carrier in this case a QR code on the packaging material at the printing stage. They then deliver the packaging material serialised to their customers. This packaging material is then activated at the brand level while being filled or packed. The plan is to eliminate the entire complexity of printing inline on packing and filling lines. This means there is no additional time required during the production phase and serialization can take place without slowing down operations even by a second.

But serialization is not new. So what’s unique that Kezzler is offering?

Absolutely, serialisation is not something new. There have been several technologies like RFID or NFC which enable serialisation. However, these technologies are prohibitive to implement at mass scale primarily because of the hardware costs involved and also because the serialisation engines that they deploy cannot handle the mass scale data. Our serialisation engine handles the location of a code among 70 billion codes in one-tenth of a second.

 

How do you achieve such high speeds?

The way we run serialisation is that instead of storing every code in a big database, which is done by most of the players in this field, we are tying the codes together with algorithmic keys, which are validating the codes. This creates a huge difference in efficiency and speed in how we do serialisation. And that’s the reason why Amcor chose us.

  

Explain with examples, how mass serialisation can enable digital consumer engagement?

When it comes to initiating promotions, previously you had to go through the retail chain and meticulously strategise the logistics for the marketing plan. With serialised products, you can communicate directly with the individual who has bought your product. In a society where speed is also becoming a big issue, this allows a disruptive way to work with brand owners, and consumers.

For retailers there’s whole new range of opportunities in terms of keeping track of what they have. In food safety terms, which is also a big issue now, you need granularity is what you do. The traditional market segmentation was limited to: gender, age groups, and professions. With serialisation, you can narrow this segmentation down to an individual to an extent that there is no approximation or extrapolation required. It also means that in the unfortunate cases of product recalls, you need not recall the entire batch but only the defective items by tracing the individual packages. From the consumer point of view, she can scan the code on the package and determine whether what she is going to buy has been recalled or not.

 

Tell us about your alliance with SGS…

We have signed a strategic alliance agreement to jointly market a global serialization and tracking and tracing services solution. SGS is one of the leaders in inspection, verification, testing and certification company with global credibility and footprint. The agreement is intended to co-market and execute serialization and tracking and tracing services for global SGS customers in the areas of FMCG, food and food safety, pharmaceuticals, as well as tobacco products, alcohol, and other beverages.

 

How will your partnership help brand owners?

The technology now exists to give billions of products its own unique digital DNA – a window into information down to the pack/unit level as required by legislative requirements. Assigning a completely unique identity enables brand owners to improve their operations, thus saving costs. For instance, track and trace technology can be used to identify hold ups and inefficiencies in the supply chain by recording the time products spend in warehouse and transit. While unique product identities would best position manufacturers to identify and pre-empt any potential issues such as highly targeted product recalls, including alerting individual consumers that scan the product code using their cell phone.

In parallel and for the reasons of fighting illegal trade, public authorities will be able to monitor, record the movement of products through supply chains from manufacturers, through logistics to the end consumers. Subsequently they will be able to trace products back to identify the point of diversion of these into illegal supply chain.