Member Article

North East expertise clinches Microsoft Innovation Award

Two North East organisations have pooled their expertise to secure the North East Microsoft Award for Innovation Through Technology. Experts at Durham-based business and technology consultants Waterstons have helped security specialists OpSec Security earn the honour for their new web-based track and trace anti-counterfeiting system.

The company produces holographic foils, labels and security products for a wide range of clients including passport authorities, several summer and winter Olympic games and global brands. Opsec’s old system previously relied on several bespoke systems to track a wide range of anti-counterfeit products. The new solution, implemented by Waterstons, which is based on Microsoft .NET2 technology delivers a track and trace system that can cope with millions of records and entries. It can also be configured to meet the specific needs of the client.

Sally Waterston, director of Waterstons, said: “Brand misuse and counterfeiting is a multi-million pound business, with the International Chamber of Commerce estimating that between five and eight percent of all world trade is in counterfeit goods. Brand owners are increasingly turning to technology to employ all available methods of protecting their assets. “By working together with OpSec we have used the best available technology tools to develop a system that allows products protected by anti-counterfeit labels to be tracked and traced by its customers and by customs officials across the world.”

The company will go through to the UK finals of the award in November. If successful, the company plans to use the £25,000 cash prize to invest in further developments of the system, including making it available through mobile technology and texting, to allow consumers to verify the authenticity of goods prior to purchase, and investigating the potential of an RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) interface.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .