Feb 1, 2008: India headquartered Bilcare Research, a maker of films and foils for blister packaging, provides unified packaging solutions across the entire spectrum of pharmaceutical value chain through five focused business activities—Research Services, Clinical Supplies, Design Lab, Research Academy and Packaging Materials. The company has developed anti-counterfeit technology through which it can mass manufacture identification tags. This is one of the first such cost effective, useful solution for the pharma industry. In an e-mail interview with BioSpectrum, Mr Mohan Bhandari, Chairman & Managing Director, Bilcare shares his views on the new technology.

What is the current size of the counterfeit of pharmaceutical products?
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), 10 percent of global medicines, worth $50 billion, are counterfeit and globally the pharmaceutical companies are incurring over $150 billion revenue loss due to compliance-related issues.

How does the new technology work in identifying counterfeit products?
To help pharmaceutical industry overcome the losses incurred on account of counterfeit drugs, we have developed a new anti-counterfeit technology. This technology will help the pharmaceutical industry in securing their brands, increasing every product’s warranty, traceability and secure the supply chain management apart from eradicating counterfeit and ensuring better healthcare compliance.

The new product uses nanotechnology with a combination of new material with unique properties and proprietary pattern recognition. Virtually impossible to duplicate, these nano-tags come with inbuilt fingerprint technology, which can be read by specially developed readers. This data is then sent through a regular GPRS cell phone to the central server for instant secure authentication, which in turn identifies pedigree of each product. For this research program, we have secured four different patents.

How is this technology different from other available secure technologies?
These nano-tags are a rare combination of a unique fingerprint based on nanotechnology and a bar code. At a blister or bottle level this technology can be implemented cost effectively as compared to other technologies such as RFID technology. The technology combination, being unique in nature, cannot be replicated. Therefore, it is virtually impossible for a counterfeiter to duplicate, which makes it a novel innovation.

How much investment and time has gone into developing this technology? When will it be available to the industry? 
Our R&D team has been working on this project for some years and has received the patent within a record time of 22 months. Regarding investments, it is difficult to say how much money we have invested on this research program so far. We will start commercial manufacturing of this new anti-counterfeit product at our Singapore facility from June 2008.

Can the pharma companies continue to sell medicines at affordable cost even after adapting the Bilcare technology?
Yes. It is a cost effective solution.