Search for Counterfeit Product Use Cases here
Fake news is all the rage at the moment, and fake products have been around for much longer than our current run of fake news. Ever since brands existed, there has always been the problem of counterfeit and fake products. Over the years there have been many solutions tried and tested and some have had some success.
With the development of Blockchain technology, brands and retailers can now be more certain of counterfeit issues and will be able to react faster using this technology. It is important to remember that Blockchain technology will not stop
The main use case is around the ability to track and trace product better – both of which were covered in the previous two areas of traceability and provenance. Were these use cases can help are related to:
- The ability to see entire history of transactions of a shared database makes it easy to ensure authenticity.
- Increased transparency across a global supply chain removes risk and protects consumers and business.
- Preventing counterfeit products entering the market in the first place
- Grey market tracking and monitoring using sophisticated technologies
- Giving the end customer trust through lifetime visibility of products
Counterfeit products benefits and outcomes
The counterfeit market is big and here are some statistics:
- ICC estimate that counterfeit products will drain $4.2trillion from global economy and put 5.4 million legitimate jobs at risk by 2022.
- Even the biggest retailers fall short of counterfeit goods, including Amazon. Can be very damaging to reputation, loss of trust.
- Huge potential in a number of markets, serving a purpose of retaining brand value, protecting legitimate suppliers (and staff) and in some cases saving lives:
- Roughly 50% of drugs sold in developing countries are counterfeit, costing pharmaceutical companies almost $18 billion P.A.
- These illegal processes have also resulted in 100,000 deaths worldwide